Almost Home
by bravevulnerability
Summary: "He cares about you, Kate. You may not see it, may not have been ready to before all of this, but he does." An AU twist to 2x18, Boom!
1. Chapter 1

Her heart is pounding, a loud but steady thud resounding through her chest. It's accompanied by the deafening rush of blood through her ears as she meanders through the dimly lit maze of the warehouse, her gun aimed and the safety off. She's ready to put an end to this, to be finished with the havoc Scott Dunn has wreaked on her life in the last five days.

"Dunn," she calls, cautiously rounding the corner with her weapon raised and ready to fire. "Give it up."

Beckett advances further through the path of boxes and poor lighting, gritting her teeth through the creaks and shudders of the building, the shadows dancing along the concrete flooring that continue to trick her.

"Nobody has to die," she adds, despite how certain she is that Dunn has no intention of backing down or changing his mind. If she could just coax the man out of hiding, or at least gain some insight to his whereabouts…

Movement from ahead catches her eye, the patter of footsteps and shifting noise of metal drawing her in deeper through the rows of cardboard boxes and decaying plastic. Beckett takes a steadying breath, securing her finger on the trigger, thinking that this could be it, that she might have found Dunn's hiding spot.

But when Kate inches closer, lifting her chin to see over the cover of metal bins, she's knocked off balance by the weight of Scott Dunn crashing down on top of her. A surprised gasp flies from her lips as he locks his arms around her upper body, trapping her in a bear hug hold before using his weight to send both of them slamming backwards into a decrepit row of metal lockers.

Beckett growls, but Dunn is a worthy opponent, stronger than she would have expected. He blocks the few hits she manages to land before throwing her into the wall like she's nothing more than a rag doll. He slams the breath from her lungs with a punch to her ribcage and the harsh pin of her wrist to the wall overhead, the force of the impact disarming her. Her back is connecting with concrete a second later, her gun stolen from her grip, and she looks up to see the barrel of her own weapon aimed at her face.

"That's how all my stories end," he pants, grinning down at her with victory flaring in those dark eyes. "With someone else dead."

Beckett braces herself out of instinct, ready to move, to roll to the side and dodge the shot, but expecting a burst of pain nonetheless. A shout startles Dunn before he can pull the trigger though, and he's instantly pivoting, firing his weapon elsewhere, but not before a shot is fired back.

The gun flies from Dunn's grip, spiraling across the floor, but Jordan Shaw catches the sliding Sig with the toe of her heel, her own weapon pointed downwards at the man. And it's over, it has to be over, but when Beckett turns on her side with a groan, her back throbbing from the rough fall, she realizes the worst of this nightmare has only begun.

"No," she whispers, the pain in her back disappearing, meaning nothing as her gaze wanders over to Castle. He's sprawled on the ground only a few feet away, the crimson spill of blood coloring the grey of the floor beneath him.

No, no, _no._ This is not happening.

"Castle," she breathes, forcing herself up and staggering towards his body only to fall back to her knees beside him. He isn't moving. "I need a bus!" she yells to Shaw, but the special agent is already heading towards the exit with Dunn in handcuffs and a phone to her ear.

"I've got paramedics on the way up," she calls back, but Beckett can't respond. Not when Castle is staring up at her, his eyes a blue storm of panic flickering with lightning strikes of pain.

"Castle, don't you dare die on me," Beckett murmurs as she presses her hands over the wound in his chest, wincing at the visible agony it elicits across his face. "Hey," she whispers, pleads, impatiently awaiting the return of his gaze. "Stay, okay? Stay with me."

His arm rises upwards, attempting to reach for her but unable make it, flopping back to his side instead. His fading eyes remain trained on her as he fights for breath, inhaling slowly through his parted lips, and god, it wasn't supposed to go like this. He was never supposed to get hurt.

She can hear people coming up the stairs, jogging towards them, and she feels the hope surge within her like a beacon in a sea of darkness. But then his eyes begin to flutter closed and the dread returns like ice water flushing through her stomach.

"No, no, Castle - Rick, _please_," she begs, lifting a hand to stroke back the hair from his forehead, but his eyes roll back, his head tilting into her palm, and he isn't with her anymore.

* * *

Kate rides with him in the ambulance, remains by his side until they're pushing the gurney past two swinging doors that lead him into the O.R and the nurses are corralling her back towards the waiting room.

She heard words like "penetrating trauma", "massive hemorrhaging", and the worst – "GSW to the chest", as they rolled him away and she instantly feels her lungs beginning to collapse within her own chest. The likelihood of his survival is dwindling with each passing minute and there is nothing she can do. She's already done enough.

It's all her fault.

For a long moment, she's left standing in the middle of that pristine hallway, breathing in the harsh smell of antiseptic and staring at those two swinging doors they rushed him through, not quite sure what to do with herself now. She's never been good at waiting, not knowing. But when she glances down, her gaze lands on her bloodied hands, the stains smeared across her skin, her clothes, and she has to rush to the nearest bathroom.

He could die.

She almost vomits in the bathroom sink.

Beckett pours all of her attention into wiping away the evidence, cleansing her skin of it; she's in the middle of scrubbing her knuckles raw, rinsing the scarlet stains from every crease and crevice that lines her skin, holding back the bile in her throat, when the bathroom door eases open.

"Detective?"

Kate lifts her head from the pink stain of the water coloring the porcelain sink to see Agent Shaw lingering hesitantly in the doorway.

"He's in surgery right now," Beckett tells her, even though the agent has yet to ask. She's surprised to hear her own voice remain steady through the sentence.

Shaw nods. "I know. I just spoke with one of the nurses. I called your people and I think they're bringing you a change of clothes."

Beckett glances down to see the bloodstains still smeared along the cuffs of her sleeves. They aren't necessarily noticeable until one got close enough to see the crimson clashing with the navy blue of her blouse, but she wouldn't mind a change of clothes. She's already disposed of the leather gloves that were beyond repair.

"Thank you."

"I also wanted to let you know that I would keep you updated on Dunn's transfer to the tombs. He's in custody, not going anywhere, so you have nothing to worry about."

Beckett nods in understanding, but can't ignore the protest swelling on her tongue. She has _so _much to worry about, so much more than the threat Scott Dunn posed to her life.

"I won't keep you, Detective, but honestly, I wanted to say it impressed me that you came in with him."

Kate's trembling fingers curl tightly around the slick white edge of the sink. Shaw is _praising _her? _Now_? And for one of the greatest mistakes she has ever made throughout her time on the job, throughout her entire career?

"It wasn't impressive," she argues quietly, her jaw clenched so tightly her teeth begin to grind. "It was foolish, and it may cost him his life."

"You made a tough decision on your feet, used the resources at hand, I'd say that's heroic. And Castle will pull through this," Shaw continues a little softer, tentatively reaching out to place a hand on Kate's rigid shoulder. While this woman may project a tough exterior for the sake of her profession, Kate thinks she can finally picture Jordan Shaw as the mother she is outside of the FBI. "And when he does…"

Shaw allows the sentence to trail. Kate glances over to her in curiosity, taking note of the knowing glint sparkling in the agent's eyes, but Beckett's brow only furrows deeper in question.

"He cares about you, Kate. You may not see it, may not have been ready to before all of this, but he does."

Kate's lips part in surprise, prepared to speak, object or agree, she isn't sure, but the bathroom door opens once more before she can. Lanie Parish is stepping inside, wearing a sympathetic smile and holding an armful of clothes that Kate recognizes as her own.

Kate swallows hard. "Thank you for everything, Agent Shaw."

"Hope to see you again sometime, Kate," Shaw replies with a gentle smile and a subtle wink before she turns, nodding to Lanie and exiting the ladies room.

"Oh, honey," Lanie sighs after a moment, moving forward to embrace her, but Kate only allows the comfort for a second, and then she's backing out of Lanie's arms.

"I'm sorry, Lanie, I just can't-"

Her best friend lifts a hand in understanding and offers up the clothes she brought in with her instead.

"I stopped by Castle's place, grabbed your favorite pair of jeans and a sweater for you. The boys should be here soon and Castle's family is on their way-"

"Oh god," Beckett chokes, covering her mouth with her hand and closing her eyes. His family. Shit, how did she not think about his family? "How am I going to tell Martha and Alexis? They're going to - they can't, they're going to hate me-"

"Katherine Beckett, this is not your fault," Lanie argues, vehement and protective, but Kate shakes her head.

"I brought him in with me when there was a man with a gun running around. I made him my backup. I _put _him in harm's way. He wouldn't have a bullet in his chest if it weren't for me," Kate mutters, her vision starting to swim again and she's forced to look away.

"Kate-"

"I need to get changed before they get here," she mumbles, turning her back on Lanie and waiting until she hears the ME sigh in defeat and slip out of the room.

Kate strips and changes quickly, tossing the shirt she wore before into the trash. If she tried hard enough, she could probably wash the stains out, but it wouldn't be worth the effort. How could she even fathom wearing a shirt that was once partially drenched in Castle's blood?

Beckett shudders at the thought and curls her fingers around the sleeves of her sweater, reminds herself to thank Lanie for bringing clothes from her closet in Castle's guest room instead of the ones she has stored away at the precinct. The softness of one of her coziest sweaters and the worn quality of her jeans is a welcome comfort compared to the stiff blouse and slacks stuffed in her locker at the Twelfth.

Beckett takes her time walking back to the waiting room, always hating the feeling of helplessness and grief such rooms tend to hold. Maybe Shaw's right; Castle is strong, maybe he'll pull through without too much trouble.

But no one, her mind counters, is immune to the death sentence a bullet can deliver.

Kate falls hard into one of the plastic chairs lined along the waiting room walls and buries her fingers in her hair, piercing her scalp with her nails and squeezing her eyes shut to keep the tears back. He can't die, he just can't. She would do anything-

A ragged sob nearly escapes from her throat and she immediately clenches her jaw to keep the rest locked away in her heaving chest. She can't break down now, not here.

"Detective Beckett?" The familiar, but frantic voice of Martha Rodgers causes her head to snap up.

She jerks to her feet at the sight of his mother and daughter, rushing anxious and terrified towards her.

God, he can't die. He can't leave them.

"What happened to my dad?" Alexis questions once they reach her, her voice small and fragile but demanding.

Kate takes a deep breath. She can do this; she delivers bad news for a living. This is no different.

Except, it is. It's worse.

"We were closing in on Dunn, the man who blew up my apartment, and Castle went in with me. I thought he was helping an agent who had been captured, but Dunn got the drop on me and he was - Castle shot him, but Dunn shot first and then he…" Kate swallows hard, wishing her voice would stop shaking so badly, stop making the situation even worse than it already is. "Castle was shot."

Martha's trembling hand rises to cover her mouth, but Alexis just stares back at her in disbelief, tears filling the ice blue pools of her eyes.

"I'm so sorry," Kate starts, clutching a hand over her stomach, trying to keep it all in check. "I shouldn't have let him come with me. I should have made him stay in the surveillance van, I-"

"No, no, darling, shh," Martha soothes, stepping forward to wrap Beckett in an embrace, so maternal and warm. Kate can't help sinking into the hug as the rebellious tears slip free. "This isn't your fault."

She doesn't deserve the comfort, not from the mother of the man she's responsible for getting shot, but the unbearable knot in her chest loosens within the tight clutch of Martha's arms and damn if she isn't grateful. She almost startles at the feel of Alexis joining the huddle, though, snaking her arms around both Beckett and her grandmother, leaning her head onto Kate's shoulder. Over the last year, she's grown closer to his daughter, but not enough to warrant this, to earn her compassion. That doesn't stop her from squeezing Alexis's trembling arm in return.

Kate holds to both Castle's mother and daughter in the middle of the waiting room and silently prays to whatever higher power that may be listening for him to come out of this alive. They all need him alive.


	2. Chapter 2

It's been over four hours since Castle went into surgery and their group has filled nearly half of the waiting room.

Esposito and Ryan arrived shortly after Alexis and Martha, the two men remaining stoic, silent, and side by side for the entire evening. Jenny – the newest addition to their little family – came by during the second hour and sat close to Ryan, speaking to the glassy eyed detective with words of positivity and encouragement. Esposito and Lanie were different. Esposito didn't need nor want words or reassurance; the presence of Lanie in the seat beside him seemed to be enough to keep him calm, anchored.

Kate keeps to herself. Martha and Alexis sit alongside her, talking amongst each other, but Beckett can't will herself to offer any phrases of reassurance that wouldn't make a difference. Instead, she lets her head hang, her fingers knotted together tightly between her knees and her gaze drilling holes into her knuckles, her focus on making the air go in and out of her lungs without faltering along the way.

"Family of Richard Castle?"

Practically the entire waiting room rises to stand, but only Martha and Alexis step forward, Alexis tugging a hesitant Kate along by the wrist when Beckett attempts to sit back down.

"Evening, I'm Doctor Kritsky," the man introduces himself with a tired but genuine smile as he summons them forward, a good sign. He wouldn't smile with anything but sympathy if Castle were dead. "Can I get your names and relations to the patient please?"

Martha is the first to speak, waving a hand over herself in introduction. "I'm Martha Rodgers, Richard's mother. This is his daughter, Alexis, and this is Kate."

The doctor pauses for a moment to look up from the clipboard in his hands at Kate. She already knows what's coming and is prepared to shuffle back to her seat when Alexis chimes in, effortlessly erasing the doctor's apparent doubt.

"Kate's my dad's girlfriend. She lives with us."

She forces her eyes to refrain from widening at the lie, how Alexis executes it with such doe-eyed innocence and ease, making it practically impossible to refute. Kritsky appraises her skeptically for a moment before deciding to move on.

"The bullet Mr. Castle took to the chest nearly nicked his left aorta," Kritsky informs them.

Kate digs her fingernails into her palms. His aorta. A blood vessel in his heart, his - he has a beautiful heart… oh god, did they fix his heart?

"It was close, but his heart was ultimately missed, spared from the worst of the damage, and we were able to remove the bullet and get the bleeding under control with little issue," Kritsky explains in a soft voice that does little to quell the riot of nerves in Kate's stomach, swirling through her system in an effort to dizzy her. "He did endure some chest trauma, some hemorrhaging," the doctor continues, the sympathetic smile she feared making an appearance with the details. "We had to insert a chest tube, but we won't have to keep it in too much longer. I expect him to make a full recovery with time."

"Oh, thank god," Martha breathes, clutching Kate's arm.

"He won't be awake for a while, he's still under the anesthetic and heavy pain medication, but you are allowed to see him, if you'd like."

Alexis nods immediately and begins pulling both Kate and her grandmother forward when Kritsky raises a hand.

"Only two at a time, please. Sorry, hospital regulations," he informs them with an apologetic frown that Kate isn't sure she buys. But she does instantly step back from their trio and forces an encouraging smile for the two redheads who look far too torn for her liking.

"Go, I can wait," she assures them, already backpedaling to her seat while Martha and Alexis both linger even though she can tell they're both itching to see him. "_Go_."

Martha nods at her in thanks and follows the doctor's lead, but Alexis pauses, a split second of indecision before she's jogging back to Kate. A jolt of surprise shudders through her chest as Alexis winds her arms around Beckett's neck.

"Thanks, Kate," she whispers, giving her only a moment to return the embrace before sprinting off to follow her grandmother and the doctor to her dad's room.

Beckett ignores the multitude of gazes she can feel resting so heavily on her back, too afraid to see what their eyes may hold, and shuffles back to her seat with her eyes low. Her body aches, the headache that formed between her brows spreading to encompass the entirety of her skull. She just wants to go back to this morning, cooking breakfast in his loft, feeling for a split second like she belonged before she banished the ridiculous thought.

She doesn't want to analyze her relationship with Castle, to dwell on what it could have done to her if he wouldn't have pulled through this. She does reluctantly entertain the idea that someday soon, exploring that relationship may be worth giving a chance. Especially when her heart already began mourning 'what could have been' a mere hour ago.

Beckett releases a heavy exhale and closes her eyes, pushing the overflow of thoughts from her throbbing brain and placing all of her concentration on resuming the difficult exercise of breathing properly while she waits.

* * *

"Beckett. Hey, sweetie, wake up."

Kate jerks, hisses when she knocks her elbow into the arm of the chair. She cuts her sleep-glazed eyes up to see Lanie hovering over her, Alexis and Martha standing beside her best friend. As Kate's vision clears, she notices the misty quality to the older woman's eyes, the red tinge to the tip of her nose.

"You can go see Richard now if you'd like. He's in room 217," Martha pipes up.

Alexis is hiding behind the curtain of her hair, but Kate imagines her features likely match her grandmother's.

Beckett takes a deep breath and rises from the seat, her legs tingling with numbness as she stands while Lanie brushes a hand down her arm to steady her.

"You don't want company?" she asks quietly, more of an assumption than a question, and Kate shakes her head.

"No," she rasps, clearing her throat, but it makes no difference, still feels dry and raw. "Thanks, Lanie."

The M.E nods and Kate spares one last glance to his mother and daughter before forcing her feet to carry her down the hallway.

She scans the plates of numbers beside the doors to each room until she finds his, but she hesitates when her hand touches the silver handle - not sure if she can endure the sight of him like this and what it will do to her. She knew that it would be bad, that he would look pale and ghostly and the opposite of everything she's grown used to, that the picture of him in that hospital bed will likely haunt her every time she closes her eyes, but she can't _not _see him. She has to know he's alive, that he's still breathing.

Kate pushes the door open and pauses when her eyes finally land on him, just like she knew she would. It scares her, how deep in disrepair her heart has fallen over the last few hours. He's going to be okay, he's going to make it, but she can't shake the feeling of _almost_. Almost losing him, almost watching the life slip away, almost having her chance for something she's never even had the opportunity to know - something she never even knew she wanted - stolen.

Beckett grits her teeth and swallows down the panic. She closes the door behind her with a soft click, taking the soundless steps towards him until she's at his bedside, close enough to touch.

Tubes, wires, and hospital machinery surround him like an intricate web of protection, the soundtrack of the heart monitor's ominous beeping causing her own heart to trip nervously, but it provides the vital proof she sought. He is still here; his almost broken heart is still beating steadily.

They've already removed the ventilator and she's grateful for it, unsure if she could have handled the sight of a tube down his throat. He does have two pieces of plastic inserted into his nostrils, the slim tubes of oxygen roping along his slack face; it causes him to appear even more frail and fragile than he actually is.

It feels ridiculous that she's able to look at dead bodies for a living and hardly flinch, yet the sight of Richard Castle in a hospital bed with clear prongs providing him air has her rattled.

Kate inches closer and gingerly grazes her index finger over the top of his hand, following the rivers of veins, avoiding the taped IV line, and noting the pale, waxy quality his skin now carries.

This was never supposed to happen. Not to him.

Beckett averts her eyes to the ceiling, wills the sting of tears away. She hasn't cried and she _won't_, there's no reason to-

"I'm sorry, Castle," she murmurs, the burn in her eyes overpowering, a single tear leaking free. She allows it to fall, lets a few others join it, just for a second. She just needs a second to let the fear, the relief, and the self-loathing spread from the repressed space in her chest.

She bites her lip, wipes her cheeks with the back of her hand before letting it drift towards his cheek. Her fingertips shake as they dust the paper thin skin beneath his eye, trailing along the contours of his bone structure to touch his jaw.

He feels so cold.

Kate withdraws her hand and glances to the chair at his bedside. It reminds her of the chair he keeps at her desk, where he sits loyally on daily basis.

She takes a seat.


	3. Chapter 3

Kate stays overnight in the waiting room, ghosting in and out of Castle's room while the nurses are otherwise occupied. She promised both Martha and Alexis she would follow their example and return 'home' for a couple of hours, but how can she go anywhere? To his home of all places? But Esposito still gives her a disapproving look when he walks in and finds her there the next morning.

"You should have gone to change at least, maybe shower. Don't you want to look your best when writer boy wakes up?" he asks her with a small smirk tugging at his lips. At least there's that, she thinks, the flicker of normalcy in the form of her colleague's usual teasing.

Beckett rolls her eyes as Espo takes a seat beside her. "I washed up in the bathroom about an hour ago."

There is a brief moment of silence, but Kate can tell he has something on his mind, something that is likely going to be said whether she likes it or not, so she simply waits.

"Ryan and I were thinking that maybe we could throw him a 'get well soon' party when he's a little more with it. For while he's stuck here, you know?"

She feels her lips curling upwards before she can stop it. "He'd love that."

"You think he'll come back after this?"

"Come back?" she echoes, her brow scrunching as she turns to look at him.

"To the precinct," Esposito clarifies slowly, as if he knows her brain is running on nothing more than the disgusting sludge that passes for coffee the nurses offered her. "You know he's going to want to come back and play cop again as soon as he can."

The mere thought of him being back in the line of fire has her heart picking up speed. She has to exhale through her nose to keep from thinking too long about the idea.

"Well, he'll have to find some other hobby to pursue because the Scott Dunn case was definitely his last," she mutters with an underlying determination simmering through her blood. She knows he'll put up a fight, use Nikki Heat and his connections with the mayor to try and weasel his way back in, but she will refuse.

Their partnership is over.

Esposito scoffs at her. "Hobby? You seriously believe that's why he spends so much time at the precinct?"

Kate chews on her bottom lip, almost hard enough to draw blood, and wills Esposito to shut up with a weaker version of the glares that usually work on him at the Twelfth. She can already sense what's coming, what he's going to say, and she can't deal with it right now.

Esposito doesn't seem to care.

"Why do you think he's been following you around all this time? What, research? The guy's done enough research to write fifty books. Listen-"

"Javi, I get it," she sighs, scraping a hand through her hair and giving him a pleading look. "Honestly, I get it."

"So, what are you going to do about it, Beckett?" he challenges, but she shakes her head, a signal that this conversation is done, and ascends from the uncomfortable chair.

"I'll handle it," is all she offers him, and then Kate is stalking down the hall, skillfully avoiding the nurse preoccupied with another impatient family member at the front desk, and taking the familiar path back to his room.

Earlier in the night, she used her badge a couple of times to get back inside, stating that she's here on official police business, keeping watch just in case another threat on his life arose. It isn't a total lie. The threat is gone, secured at Rikers by now, but she will still keep watch over Castle for her own peace of mind.

Beckett sighs and leans against his door. Alexis and Martha will be back soon, and she'll force herself to leave then, just for a couple of hours. She's dead on her feet and no good to anyone here. But the thought of leaving him…

Kate pinches the bridge of her nose between her thumb and forefinger.

She'll go back to the loft, take a shower, and come back when she looks at least somewhat presentable. Castle is fine, he doesn't need her standing like a sentinel at his bedside; it would probably be better for him if she isn't here at all.

She remains outside his door for a long time.

* * *

Kate jerks awake to the sharp ring of her phone beside her head and startles up from the couch disorientated. She glances with bleary eyes to the clock in Castle's kitchen and gawks at the realization that over three hours have passed since she returned to his loft for a quick shower and small meal.

"Dammit," she growls before answering her still ringing phone. "Beckett."

Stupid. She sat down for just a moment after her shower, right before she intended to leave again to return to the hospital, already dressed and ready to head out the door. Apparently, her body decided on an unwanted nap before she could.

"Kate? Are you still at the loft, darling?"

"I'm leaving right now," Beckett informs his mother, standing from the couch on legs that waver under her for a second too long. Amidst all of the chaos that's consumed the last twelve hours – no, she checks the time on her phone and sighs, make that sixteen – she hasn't managed to consume anything more than a protein bar. No wonder her body is rioting. "Did you need me to grab something?"

"No dear, I'd only called to ask if _you _would like something for a late lunch," Martha explains while Kate snags her bag from the end table and fishes for the house key he gave her. She should really just give up and put the slim silver key on her keychain already, it would save her a lot of time.

"No, thank you, Martha. I'm fine," she lies, but she is. Food will likely only add to the nausea that already swirls through her stomach on a constant loop.

Martha huffs in disapproval. "Katherine, you need to eat."

"I had something to eat while I was here." It's not another lie. She had the protein bar before she stepped under the hot spray of the shower.

"You're a horrible actress, dear."

Kate can't help the quiet laugh that slips past her lips as she strides out into the hallway, locking the door behind her and starting for the elevator.

"Fine," she relents, resting back against the gleaming mahogany panels of the elevator wall. "Would you like me to pick up something for you and Alexis too. I'm on my way to the hospital right now."

"That would be - oh, just a moment."

Kate slows to a stop in the lobby, straining to hear Martha's muffled conversation with someone else, someone who sounds a lot like Castle's surgeon.

"We're going to have to put a hold on the orders, dear," Martha exclaims, but Kate can't determine whether her voice is rushed and rising by the octave because of panic or excitement.

"Is everything okay?" Beckett asks with her heart in her throat, but Martha's response has the rabbiting muscle calming, sinking back into the cage of her ribs, and then picking up again.

"It's wonderful, kiddo! Richard's awake!"

* * *

She's tempted to indulge in the advantages of owning a police cruiser to race through mid afternoon traffic and arrive at the hospital faster. But aside from some minor speeding, she still reaches New York Presbyterian in record time without breaking any laws, and finds Martha waiting for her as she comes bounding down the hall that leads to Castle's room.

"How is he?" she gets out, a little breathless from her sprint through the hospital corridors. His mother only smiles at her, soft and bubbling with elation.

"As well as to be expected," Martha informs her with a contented sigh. "He's been in and out, but he spoke briefly with Alexis."

Kate slumps against the wall outside his room, the thick knot that's been living in her chest loosening, the sore muscle of her heart finally able to relax. "Good, that's really good."

"He asked for you, you know," Martha adds with a grin that's a tad too sly to be considered innocent. "Your name was the first thing he said, actually."

Beckett tucks her chin to her chest, staring a hole into the toes of her boots.

"I was the last person he saw before he passed out," she reasons without meeting Martha's smug gaze.

"Of course, darling," his mother agrees, but when Kate looks up to catch a glimpse of the older woman's face, she's met with a shimmer of knowledge that has Kate's palms sweating.

The flash of Alexis's red hair in the doorway defuses the awkward sliver of tension and Kate relishes in the second wave of relief that floods her veins when the younger Castle shoots her a pleased smile.

"He's awake again," Alexis informs them both, but her eyes remain locked on Kate. "Want to see him, Detect - Kate?"

Her heart catches for just a second, but she nods through the sudden nerves that lace around her stomach. It isn't that she doesn't _want_ to see him, not at all, it's just… she spent many hours in Castle's room since the surgery, but in that time he was unconscious.

Martha squeezes her arm and Beckett offers her a waning smile of appreciation for the gesture before making her way towards the doorway.

"We'll be in the cafeteria if you need us, dear," Martha assures her, looping an arm through Alexis's, guiding the teen down the hall, and leaving Kate alone to face the man who almost died because of her.

She takes a shallow breath outside his door, fiddles with the chain around her neck. He's alive, he's awake, and she needs to see him.

"Beckett," he hums when he notices her in the doorway, a sleepy grin adorning his lips that sends something more than relief rushing through her blood.

She can't seem to control the way her feet take her to him without a moment of preamble.

"Hey Castle," she murmurs, easing down into the chair at his bedside.

His arm extends from its folded resting place atop his stomach, reaching for her hand, but barely able to lift his own. She gives in on a huff, curls her fingers around his palm. He's cold, still cold, his knuckles frigid and thick fingers chilled. She embraces the hand between both of hers, hoping to pass along some of her meager warmth.

"You okay?" Castle asks, hazy eyes doing their best to assess her. "Dunn-"

"I'm fine," she promises. "Shaw already had backup on the way. We got him."

"Good. 'S good. Thought I lost you again," he sighs, wincing with it. "Ow, sighing kinda hurts. So does breathing."

Kate's brow furrows though, her attention caught on that first sentence as she leans in closer. One of her hands abandons his to dust her fingertips along the side of his still colorless face to gain his attention.

"Again?" she echoes, watching his eyes flutter in an attempt to stay awake.

"Your apartment. When it blew up, thought you were gone. Scared me, Beckett."

Kate grazes her thumb along the papery skin of his knuckles.

"No, you seem have this horrible habit of saving my life lately." Castle's lips tug upwards in a weak smile, but a smile nonetheless, and it quells the still heavy dose of worry flowing like acid through her system. "Hell of a shot, by the way."

"I was aiming for his head, but… think I missed," he slurs.

"Close enough," she murmurs, reaching forward to comb his hair back. His eyes flicker up to her at the action, a gentle touch of surprise rippling through the cloudy sea of his irises, but she can't find the will to care. She's exhausted, he almost died; touching him helps "Go to sleep, Castle."

"You too, Beckett. You look so tired, wanna crawl in?"

She chuckles at the lazy waggle of his eyebrows and pats his hand. "I'm not _that_ tired."

"You're just scared you'll like it," he muses through a yawn, his hand going slack in hers a second later.

She props her chin in her palm, allowing her gaze to remain content on the slackened features of his face, finally resembling peaceful instead of a deathly pallor.

He may be right.


	4. Chapter 4

"Thought you would be out apartment hunting," Castle rasps with a small smile for her and she clenches her fists to keep her face from falling apart at just the sight of him. As usual.

He's been in the hospital for four days, but it's still a challenge for her to see him laid up in an overly starched bed with needles in his arms and medical equipment surrounding his body. All she can think about is how he looked bleeding out on the floor of the warehouse, how she's the one who put him here.

Kate clears her throat and drifts in closer, standing at his bedside instead of settling in the usual chair she resides in during her regular visits. "I think that can be put off for a while."

"Really?" His eyebrows quirk. "I figured you would be itching to get out of my loft by now."

It's a joke, nothing more, but with his defenses down, she can see the yearning that has steadily blossomed over the last year. It's typically well hidden, nothing she's ever taken seriously, but it's breaking through his carefully constructed barriers now, revealing itself to her.

Oh, Castle.

"With Alexis in school, and your mother pretty busy herself, someone's going to need to be around full time."

Rick sobers at that and she can already feel the protest before he even begins.

"Kate." He speaks her name like a reprimand, a strong disapproval coating his tone. "That is not your job."

"Gunshot wounds aren't easy to recover from, Castle. I've seen plenty of officers take a hit and be out for months and they don't spend that time taking care of themselves."

"Yes, but-"

"And I'm already at the loft so it's not like it's any inconvenience," she shrugs, probably a little too ready to take care of him. But she owes him this much.

She's the reason he was shot; she's the reason he was in the crosshairs in the first place. She can stand by him through his recovery, she can accompany him to physical therapy appointments and assist him in adjusting to the temporary hardships of healing - she can do this for him.

"You have a job."

"And a few extra vacation days left. We'll spend the first few getting you settled, and then, once I go back to work… I'll see what I can do."

He shakes his head, adamant in a way she isn't used to. "I'll just hire a nurse or something, someone to check in every day. I can take care of myself, Beckett."

She almost laughs at him, not only because he's wrong, but because he is so blatantly lying. He thinks he knows her so well, but he underestimates how well _she _knows _him. _He can't bear his way through a head cold without whining for her sympathy. Richard Castle is not going to recover from a gunshot wound in solitude.

"Well," she shrugs, forcing a thin smile that earns a frown from him. "Now you don't have to."

He looks doubtful, wary, as if he can't trust that she's being serious, but that's okay. She'll prove him wrong. She'll stay at the loft, get him through this, and then she'll find her own place. After he's healed. After he's better.

* * *

Castle insisted Alexis return to school after only a couple of days, encouraged his mother to restore her own daily routines as well, so intent on forbidding anyone to alter their schedules, their lives, for him. But arguing with Kate Beckett is an entirely new feat.

She still goes to work every morning, spending a full day at the precinct, but by late afternoon, she's back in his hospital room, usually before he's even awake from his second nap of the day. She remains there, standing like a sentinel at his bedside, ghosting in his doorway long past nightfall.

"Are you even sleeping?" he murmurs on her third consistent night of unauthorized visitation.

Kate rouses from her seat in the cramped, plastic chair on the right side of his bed. Even in the dimness of his hospital room, the city lights spilling through the blinds of the window their only source of illumination, he can see the exhaustion that shadows her bones, lines her features, carved into her skin and staining purple beneath her eyes.

"No," she confesses, but the honesty doesn't surprise him anymore, not like it once would have.

Since he awoke from surgery nearly a week ago, Kate has slowly allowed him to see a side of her she normally keeps locked and guarded behind walls that were too high to climb, too strong to penetrate, let alone gain more than a peek through the thinned cracks in the mortar. But here, with him in the seclusion of his hospital room, she isn't Detective Beckett and he isn't her annoying shadow.

Here, they're the people behind those roles, and it has him actually savoring each day spent in his hospital bed. Because even with the burn of the bullet that pierced his chest still alive and searing through every waking moment, he's growing to enjoy this time with her so much more. So much so, that he almost doesn't want to be released tomorrow.

"Why?"

Kate diverts her eyes to the floor, her hair falling in a short curtain around her cheeks.

"Can't. I see - too many people I know dying," she mumbles, tangling her fingers in her lap before unfurling them, splaying the digits over her thighs. "I get a nap in here and there, Castle. I'm fine."

"You're not," he argues on a sigh, but she doesn't answer him. "Kate, come here."

Her eyes cut to him from beneath her lashes, subtle calculation and the threat of being spooked lurking in the faded hazel.

"What do you need?"

Oh, would it ruin everything if he said _you_? Probably so. He settles for the alternative.

"Come sit with me."

"Castle, stop trying to get me into bed with you," she teases, mustering a clever but waning grin for him.

He pats the empty bed space insistently.

"C'mon, Beckett, it's my last night here. Make it special."

She huffs a laugh, but rises from her seat, causing his chest to flutter with something other than agony for a change.

"You won't let up until I do this, will you?" she murmurs, crossing her arms while she approaches him.

He responds with a careful shrug of his shoulders.

"Not really. So you might as well give in to the injured guy in the hospital bed."

"Incorrigible," he hears her grumble as she places a knee on the bed.

"Ooh yes, talk smart to me. Maybe my heart monitor will start racing."

She purses her lips, but they twitch, trying to repress her smile while she gently eases down beside him. There's enough room in the hospital bed for two, but she stays perched on the very edge, not even touching him.

That won't do.

It causes an arrow of pain to strike his sternum, but Rick shifts closer to her, nudging her with his shoulder.

"Castle, stop it," she growls, nudging him back, but lacking her usual force. "You're going to hurt yourself and then you'll be stuck here even longer."

"Wouldn't mind that too much if every night was like this," he grins, waggling his eyebrows at her while Beckett's eyes roll, but her head drops back into one of his spare pillows and he considers it a victory. "Did you tell the boys I said thanks for the party?"

That has her lips spreading again. "You mean the one you fell asleep in the middle of?"

"Hey, I'm on drugs. I can't help when the overwhelming urge to nap takes over. Besides, I enjoyed the portion of it that I was awake for."

"I think the nurses hate us all," she chuckles, glancing towards the closed door. "With me breaking protocol all the time and then barging through the waiting room with a squad of officers and balloons today."

He has to refrain from laughing, the rumble will set his chest aflame, but his grin stretches wide.

"They're probably having a party of their own knowing I'm leaving in the morning."

She hums with amusement, relaxes a little further into the raised half of his bed.

"Kate?" he murmurs when he feels her finally settling in at his good side, the side without the still stinging line of an incision scar.

This is the closest they've ever been, he realizes. He can smell the sweet aroma of her hair, the flavor of cherries and the underlying scents of sweat and oil, can feel the warmth of her burning through his hospital gown.

Kate Beckett is intoxicating.

"What, Castle?" she mumbles and he notices her eyes are falling shut, her lashes fluttering in the dimness of the room.

"It's not too late, you know. To back out of staying at the loft."

They aren't the words he wants to say, but ever since she had practically vowed to take care of him the other day, he's been trying to think of ways to change her mind, to get her to back out of adopting the obligation he doesn't want to be.

"Will you shut up and stop trying to change my mind? Or are you just trying to kick me out of your place?"

He sputters, too many reassurances bubbling on his tongue all at once, but Kate laughs at him, reaches over to pat his cheek with a patronizing smirk.

"I'm coming home with you tomorrow. Now, go to sleep."

She rests back against the extra pillow, ignoring his imploring gaze on her and instead closing her eyes, drifting off into a light sleep after only a few minutes. But he remains wide awake and restless beside her.

Kate Beckett is coming home with him, just like he's always wanted, so why does it feel so wrong?


	5. Chapter 5

The drive to the loft is agonizing to watch. He's stiff in the backseat of the town car that his mother insisted on using for his return, his spine a sharp rod of tension and every muscle of his face pinched.

"We should have just rented a limo, arrived back home in style," Castle grinds out, his knuckles going white as he grips the leather upholstery of the seats.

Kate takes one of his clenched fists, tries rubbing her hand up and down his forearm to distract him.

It works.

He turns his eyes to her in bewilderment, offering her a dopey smile that has the weight sitting atop her chest lightening.

Kate never intended to ride home in the same vehicle with Castle and his family, insisting that she could meet them at the loft on her own, but Martha refused to allow it. So here they are, Martha in the front seat, conversing with the driver, while Kate, Alexis, and Castle are crammed in the back – the two women acting as bumper pads for him every time they hit a pothole or made a sharp turn.

"Do you want another pill, Dad? The doctor said if you-"

"No thanks, Pumpkin. I'm fine. Really."

Alexis and Kate share a doubtful look. Over the last week, Kate has learned how stubborn Castle can be. He doesn't like the pain medication, only resorting to the thumb-sized pills when his pain is elevated past bearable levels and even then, there tends to be a degree of resistance from him.

"C'mon Castle, with traffic, it'll be another twenty minutes before we make it to your place," Kate reasons, squeezing his arm. "You really want to be in agony for that long?"

The time estimation causes him to wince, but he gives her a baleful look when Alexis holds up the pill for him with a raised brow. He downs the medication with a sip from Kate's bottled water, grimacing as it trails down his throat.

"I could have made it the entire ride without a pill," he mumbles, pouting like a petulant child, but she rewards him with the tentative lace of her fingers through his.

It's just for support, she reminds herself. Completely innocent and friendly support.

"You could have," Kate concurs with a small nod. "But you didn't have to."

"Making a pretty good nurse so far, Beckett. Now all you need is the outfit-"

"Dad," Alexis scolds on a sigh. Kate chuckles, waves off his daughter's exasperation.

"Don't worry, Alexis. Inappropriate humor is nothing new. Probably a good sign actually," she mutters, earning a disgruntled huff from Castle at her side. But he squeezes her hand, reminds her that their fingers are still intertwined.

When they finally reach the loft, Castle's body is less stiff, no longer so fragile to every movement, but escorting him from the car to the sidewalk, into the lobby, the elevator, is a struggle nonetheless. He leans on her a lot, grunting with frustration every time. Beckett supports him with an arm around his back, a hand splayed at his ribs, while Alexis attempts to balance out his opposite side.

"You've got this," she murmurs as the elevator doors slide open, earning a fleeting look of gratitude from the corner of his eye.

The arm around her waist tightens ever so slightly, his large hand gripping her hip, giving the bone a gentle but shaking squeeze before they can begin down the hall. She tries her best not to lean into the touch.

"You got him?" Alexis asks her, hastily withdrawing her keys. She releases her father at Beckett's nod and rushes ahead to unlock the front door.

Martha goes in first with Alexis, both women hurrying to Castle's bedroom to prepare him a place to rest. Kate slows to a stop in the entryway, allows him a moment to catch his breath.

"You're almost there, Castle," she promises, but a line of sweat has stained the back of his t-shirt and he's pursing his lips in what she would guess is hope of controlling the ragged stop and start of his breathing. "A few more steps and you're home free."

He curls his fingers at her hip again in lieu of an answer as Alexis comes bounding back into sight, offering a thumbs up. Kate covers his hand for a brief second, squeezes back before urging them both on.

They stagger to his bedroom together, his hand tightening in hers every time he makes even the most minor of missteps, each one evoking a visible ripple of pain through his chest. It takes longer than she knows Castle would prefer, but soon enough, they're walking through his bedroom doorway, shuffling to the king-sized bed in the center of the room.

Alexis and Martha step out, promising to return within minutes – his mother mentioning retrieving their belongings from the town car and Alexis insisting on aiding her, tossing a hopeful glance to Beckett before she can go. Kate nods her reassurance and feels Castle release a careful exhale.

"Fuck," he wheezes once his mother and daughter are out of the room. He has to stop at the edge of the mattress, his body seizing up again and his grip on her fingers bruising. She doesn't rush him, doesn't try to loosen his grasp.

"Bad?" she murmurs, placing her hand to his torso, trying to help his body straighten, steady, before he doubles over.

"It feels like - like my chest is about to burst into flames, or split in two, maybe both," he rasps, his eyes blinking rapidly as if to dispel tears. "I just can't move, can't sit-"

"Yes, you can, because I'm going to help you. Just follow my lead." Kate gingerly rotates his body towards her and curls her fingers at his elbows while he lowers slowly, his breath rushing out of him the second his backside hits the edge of the bed. She focuses only on him and his slow descent to the bed, the slump of relief in his shoulders once he heaves his legs along after him onto the mattress. "Your bed's just a little lower than the hospital's, but you'll get used to it."

Castle hums his assent, the tension in his body uncoiling as his clenched eyes finally flutter open, finding her still leaning over him. They linger for a moment too long on her face, trailing from her eyes to her mouth, before eventually flicking towards the nightstand.

"Beckett," he murmurs, still trying to catch his breath, function past the pain. "I have something for you."

She straightens, arching an eyebrow in response. "Oh?"

"Open the top drawer to my nightstand."

She studies him skeptically, unsure if it's the pill from earlier talking or-

He starts reaching for it himself and she has to swat his hand away.

Beckett slides the polished wooden drawer open and glances to him for further instruction, but Castle is merely watching her, apparently waiting for her to proceed. Once she examines the drawer littered with sticky notes and a stray paperback, moves past the stupid blush that the box of condoms in the corner elicits, she understands why. Sitting neatly in the middle of the drawer is her father's watch.

Her breath catches.

She draws it out carefully, smoothing her thumb over the repaired glass, and meets his expectant eyes with her own threatening to sting, an untamable smile tugging at her lips.

"Sorry I didn't have the time to gift wrap it," he jokes, but she's too busy battling with the liquid salt swimming through her vision to laugh.

"I don't - I can't believe you found it. Thank you."

He's smiling back at her fondly now, his eyes a gleaming shade of blue, brimming with a brightness not even the painkillers can dull. "You're welcome. I found it in the wreckage, had it fixed."

She's tempted to kiss him. He's in pain, hazy with medication, and already heading into another long bout of sleep the pills tend to induce, but the way he's looking at her now…

"Hey guys?"

Beckett turns her head to see Alexis standing in the bedroom doorway.

"I know Dad's diet is a little stricter, but Kate, did you want anything specific for dinner? Gram is ordering Chinese now."

"Chinese is fine," Beckett grins, sliding the watch back onto its resting place around the naked skin of her wrist.

"Hey, what about me? Please don't tell me I'm having applesauce again," Castle whines.

"Don't worry, Castle. We'll find you something with more variety and have dinner ready for you when you wake up from your nap," she placates, resisting the ridiculous urge to touch her hand to his face, to caress his cheek with her fingertips.

He huffs, but settles himself back against the temple of pillows his mother and daughter arranged for him to sleep against. She turns to go, to follow Alexis out into the living room, but bends forward first, brushing a breath of a kiss to his cheek.

His eyes flutter open, wide with shock and awe, but she's already drifting away, softly shutting the bedroom door behind her before he can say a word.

* * *

On his first night back, Castle's substitute for a bath was Kate gently scrubbing at his body with a washcloth after dinner. He flushed with embarrassment throughout the entire ordeal, the intimacy of her wiping at the bare skin of his chest unsettling, but she kept a light conversation going to keep them both from overanalyzing the situation and it was fine.

Tonight, though, he insisted that he try a shower. On his own.

As a result, she's been anxiously standing outside of his bathroom door for the past fifteen minutes, listening far too closely because he should _not _be in there all alone. But he was adamant, practically pitching a fit at the idea of her assisting him through another bathing process.

All seems fine for the first few minutes, but then she hears a crash and a curse and she's going in before she can even warn him.

"Castle-"

"I'm okay," he hisses from behind the partially closed shower door.

Kate snags a towel and hurries over to him anyway. She keeps her eyes trained on his face when she steps inside, cuts off the water, and kneels beside his collapsed body.

"Here," she murmurs, forcing her vision to remain on the opposite wall as she waits for him to cover his lower half with the towel.

"You didn't need to come in here," he growls, still attempting to steady his breathing from the harsh pants rushing past his lips.

Kate sighs under her breath and patiently waits for him to give her the all clear.

He's frustrated and she can understand why; it's hardly been 24 hours since his release, but she's had to assist him in practically everything since he awoke that morning. She doesn't mind, but it isn't hard to see that he does. He hates relying on her in this way, burdening her, allowing her to watch him struggle. She can relate, really, because she already knows she would be twice as stubborn if she were in his place.

"Okay," he grumbles and she returns her attention to see him slumped against the slick tile wall with the thick, white towel draped across his waist and tucked under his thighs.

"What happened?" she murmurs, using a smaller hand towel to blot at his chest, doing her best to avoid the stitches and the wincing her touch induces.

"Apparently, I no longer have balance," he retorts, the words drenched in bitterness. "I was fine, almost finished rinsing the soap off, and then I just slipped."

She studies the sutures in his side with a critical eye, the angry red skin around the entry wound in the middle of his chest. "Nothing tore, right?"

He shakes his head, his frown deepening. "I caught myself with my hands for the most part. It's fine. Just hurt."

She purses her lips. "Why weren't you in the seat, Castle?"

The shower seat was installed specifically to avoid this and yet, here he is, on the floor, in the worst-case scenario.

"I _was_. I got up to turn the water off," he informs her with an indignant huff and Kate rolls her eyes.

"Why couldn't you just call me in? I'm here to help you, Rick."

"And you have been. Nonstop. I appreciate it, Beckett, I _do_, but this is ridiculous. I'm not going to have you come in here just to turn a shower nozzle for me," he protests.

She really does not have the patience for this.

"You were shot in the chest because of me, Castle. Therefore, I am damn well going to take care of you and you are going to let me. Even if that means calling me in while you're showering to turn off the water. It's not like it's even a big-"

"Beckett."

She pauses to see his eyes rising to hers in surprise, his brow furrowing in concern, and – shit. She bites her lip, ensuring no more words will slip free. She's already said too much.

"Because of you?" he echoes.

Kate turns her gaze to her knees, glaring down at the wet stains blotting her jeans. "I shouldn't have let you come in with me."

He is silent for a few seconds and she's too cowardly in that moment to lift her head, to see the truth that he will always be too kind to admit.

"Kate, I don't have the strength to lean forward right now, so you need to come closer."

Her brow furrows as she glances up to him in confusion.

"Come here," he urges, wiggling his fingers and waiting for her to place her tentative hand in his. "Thank you. Now, this is not your fault."

"Castle-"

His hand squeezes.

"Do you really think I would have stayed behind, let you go after Dunn by yourself?" he demands, a look on his face that she has a feeling he wears during serious talks with Alexis. "Because I think we both know that never would have happened. So if anyone's to blame here, it's me. But honestly, I place most of the fault on the guy who shot me." His thumb skims over her knuckles and she has to bite her lip again, teeth sinking deeper into the long abused flesh, surprised to realize it's threatening to tremble. "You owe me nothing, Kate. Please don't make yourself put up with me just because you think you have to."

She lifts her eyes to see him watching her, waiting for some type of response, and she gently squeezes his hand in return.

"I'm here because I want to be."

"Then stay as long as you like. Continue to witness all of my dignity go down the drain."

Kate huffs a laugh and tugs on the hand in hers. "Shut up, Castle, and hold onto your towel."

She helps him up from the shower floor after their little heart to heart, knowing that if they remain like this any longer, she would say - or do - something neither of them are ready for, and reluctantly leaves him to adjust his towel more securely.

His shooting, his brush with death, doesn't change things, but it's certainly amplified them. Her feelings for Castle have been a confusing jumble for quite a while now, tentative and terrifying, but now… each time she looks at him, all she can think about is how his death would have affected her, devastated her; it has the idea of pursuing something more with him feeling a lot less farfetched.

She doesn't want to miss out on the chance for something great, something that could actually be good for her.

But she doesn't want to rush into anything either.

After she's certain he can stand without issue in his room, she gives him the privacy to change into his boxers, some sweatpants, and a zip up hoodie - his usual attire since returning from the hospital. She waits for him in his office, dusting her fingers along the rows of books she's admired up close more than once since moving into the temporary haven of his loft.

Minutes pass and Kate settles against the front edge of his desk, studies the interior of the study, the view it has into the living room, the kitchen, imagines the countless hours he spends here, writing Nikki Heat. Writing about her.

"Clear," he calls and she pushes off from the edge to re-enter his room.

"Are you ready to have dinner with your family now?" she inquires, noticing something spark in his eyes, bright and tender and not making sense, just like the smile spreading across his lips as he takes the hands she offers to him.

"Sure, Beckett," he murmurs, some of the strange awe retreating while they begin their shuffle towards the living room, where he'll relocate to the couch to have his meal. "Where you go I will follow."

"Good, because you kinda don't have a choice," she teases, relishing a little too much in the fact that she can elicit that genuine smile on his face even while he's recovering from a gunshot wound.

"Touché," he quips, his thumb grazing the edge of her knuckles. "But, even if I did, it's pretty obvious I'd always follow you."

"Pain meds making you sentimental?" she hums, choosing to ignore the clenching in her chest. Part of her wishes he wouldn't, that he'd run in the opposite direction, that he'd stop following in her footsteps towards inevitable destruction.

But the other part of her… it embraces the bright warmth in her chest that his words elicit.

"Mm, a little. Still true."

For him, she wishes she could construct a better path to walk down.


	6. Chapter 6

When she walks through the door, steps into the warmth of the loft bathed in springtime sunlight from the opened windows, he's waiting for her, a delighted grin spreading across his lips at the sight of her.

"Hey, how was your day?" Rick greets as he strides towards her. But her brow creases in confusion at how he moves across the room, smooth and with no trouble at all.

When she left this morning, he was still unable to move without gritting his teeth.

"Fine?" she answers in uncertainty, startling at the feel of his hands on her shoulders, trailing down her arms to cup her elbows. "What are you doing out of bed?"

"Contrary to belief, I do actually accomplish more than lounging around in bed all day, Beckett. Well, when you're not in the bed with me, that is."

Her jaw drops, but before she can question him and his insane insinuation, one of his hands is gliding up to cradle her cheek, angling her mouth. And then he's kissing her, a soft caress of his lips over hers in greeting, and she doesn't mean to, she really doesn't, but she lifts into him, wrapping her arms around his neck and slipping her tongue in his mouth as if they do this all the time.

Kate hums, arches on her toes and strokes her tongue along the roof of his mouth while his hands drift down her sides, lay claim to her waist. Her body already knows what to do before her mind can even attempt to catch up and she finds that she's completely okay with that. As long as she can keep kissing him.

Castle's fingers move to the collar of her leather jacket, helping her shrug it from her shoulders, but just as the fabric hits the floor, he gasps. Not in pleasure, but in pain, and her eyes flutter open in concern as he begins to collapse forward.

Kate catches him as his knees give out, falling to the floor with his crumbling body. His eyes go wide, his face pales.

"Rick, what-"

She sees the blood bloom from the center of his chest, coloring his shirt a devastating crimson, dripping to the floor in splattering drops that land on her shoes-

"_Castle_-"

His name is a choked, strangled thing as it rips its way past her lips, pieces of a sob she refuses to let free clawing their way up her throat. She glances around the guest room, trying in vain to catch her breath. She's in his guest room, it's still dark outside, middle of the night kind of dark, and she - she was dreaming.

Just dreaming.

Kate scrapes a trembling hand through her hair, dampened with sweat and sticking to her neck. She needs to sleep; it's her first day back at work tomorrow since his shooting nearly two weeks ago and the last thing she wants is to feel overcome with exhaustion while she's on the job. But her heart is thundering too loud and the images of her dream, the nightmare of him dying in front of her all over again, is playing like a loop in her head and she just - she needs to see.

Needs to see anything but the shocked horror bleeding through his features while the bloom of crimson stains his shirt, spreads out across his chest.

Kate kicks off the sheets tangled around her legs, wipes at the sweat clinging to her neck as she wrenches open the bedroom door and tiptoes down the stairs. She's mindful to be quiet, not wanting to risk waking Alexis more than she may have already, but she doesn't truly realize what she's doing until she's practically sprinting through his living room, slipping through his office and into his bedroom, where he lies fast asleep. At peace and still breathing.

She soundlessly shuts the door behind her, drifts to his bedside on the balls of her feet, and leans over him with her breath held and her lips pursed, critically accessing the front of his grey hoodie. No blood.

The air rushes from her lungs and Kate presses gentle fingers to his neck, letting them linger on the steady beat of his pulse. His pain medication knocks him out pretty thoroughly, gives him the ability to sleep a full eight hours without interruption, and gives her the opportunity to examine without waking him.

The dream probably made some sense psychologically. Well, Rick getting shot again does, but the rest… the rest doesn't. What the hell is she doing making out with Castle in her dreams?

Sure, they've grown closer – she spends the majority of her free time in his room or on his couch, talking about everything, nothing, soothing his misery after physical therapy with the distraction of a movie or a simple board game. And yeah, maybe she's thought about what it would be like sometimes to know the press of his lips, the taste of a kiss from his mouth, but it wasn't – she didn't… she's not ready for more. Neither is he.

He's supposed to be recovering and she's supposed to be aiding in the healing process, not fantasizing about making out with him.

Kate pushes two fingers to the throb of a headache forming above the ridge of her brow, exasperated with her own line of thinking, and shifts away from his side of the bed, wanders towards the opposite end.

Her side.

Well, not _her side_, but where she usually settles when they watch a movie from his bed on the days he's too wiped out to venture to the couch, where she resides while they read books side by side, where she simply keeps him company on the harder days.

She releases a quiet sigh through her nose and eases onto her damn side of the bed, her breath in her throat as the mattress dips, but Castle still doesn't stir. He's peacefully asleep, his chest rising and falling in a steady rhythm, and she just needs a few more minutes to reassure herself, to seek solace in his proof of life, and then she'll return to her own room.

But for now, Kate pulls her knees up to her chest and folds her arm atop one of the spare pillows, supports her head with her hand, and watches him sleep.

* * *

Castle blinks awake at the bright sunlight streaming through his open window shades, blinding his still bleary eyes. He grunts and turns his head away from the glare, lifts his hand to scrub at his eyes, but a weight on his forearm restricts him. He glances down in curiosity to see Kate Beckett's head on his bicep.

Huh. He doesn't remember Kate coming into his room the night before and he can't understand why she would be here now. In his bed, her face buried in his ribs, her chest against his arm, her fingers hooked in the waistband of his pajama bottoms.

Not that he minds waking up this way. With Kate Beckett in his bed.

Holy shit. Dreams do come true.

"Kate," he rasps, wiggling his fingers against her stomach where his hand is trapped.

She jerks, her body jostling his, and he has to grit his teeth against the dull shot of pain that climbs up his side, spreads through his upper body like venom.

"Shit, I'm sorry." Kate's already sitting up, hovering above him with worry, her hands fluttering down his sides in near frantic concern.

"It's fine, I'm fine," he assures her, and he really will be in just a few seconds, the throb of poison already receding. "Are you?"

Her eyes dart up from his chest to meet his gaze, her brow falling into that cute furrow and her lips puckering ever so slightly. "What?"

"Are you okay?" he reiterates, his gaze flicking down to the space she occupied beside him, back to the sheepish expression slowly spilling through her features. "You're always welcome to sleep in here, Kate, but-"

Beckett groans and sits back on her heels, buries her face in her hands for a moment before looking back to him in apology.

"I'm sorry, Castle. I didn't mean to fall asleep in here. I just - I had - I'd only come in to check on you, and I sat down for just a second," she explains, rubbing at her eyes. He knows that isn't the whole story, more likely just the bones of one, but he won't push.

"I hate to break this to you, but I don't have an alarm set in here."

Her brow dips into an adorable crinkle once more before her eyes widen in understanding. She's going to be late for work.

She's cursing as she smoothly glides off of his bed and sprints out of his room. He listens as she jogs up the stairs, hurrying around the upper level floor of the guest room. She's back in his room only minutes later, dressed in her usual attire and looking only a little less put together than usual.

"I'll see you for lunch?"

"Only if you want to," he answers out of reflex, watching her eyes roll at the response. "But otherwise, yes."

"Do you want me to bring you anything?" she asks, stepping closer and scanning his nightstand to make sure all of his medications are lined up and he still has a full bottle of water in reach.

"Maybe you could just pick up some soup? So you don't have to cook or anything when you get here," he suggests, even though he is so over soup after these past two weeks of maintaining a liquid diet. He could go his entire life without another bowl of soup after this ordeal.

She nods, a thoughtful expression swirling over the tired but lovely lines of her face. "I'll try to deviate from the usual order of chicken noodle."

He smiles up at her. "You're such a wonderful caretaker, Detective Beckett. Don't know where I'd be without you."

She huffs a laugh, a familiar but exhausted sound, while she checks her watch, biting her bottom lip at the time she reads, in a hurry once more.

"Okay, Castle, I'll see you at lunch," she murmurs absentmindedly, but then she's leaning forward and brushing a kiss to the corner of his mouth, quick and thoughtless and oh so wonderful.

She freezes the second it happens, but it's already too late, her lips still touching his, and he risks evoking that crippling burn in his chest, but lifts his arm, splays a hand at her hip to keep her from running away in panic.

"I wasn't - I didn't mean-" Her lips keep brushing his as she speaks, making him wish she _did_ mean to because this is hardly a kiss and it already has electricity fizzling through his bloodstream, making him want so much more.

"It's okay," he murmurs, calm, attempting to prevent the World War 3 that is all too likely to occur in her head after this. "Just go to work and bring me some soup like always, Kate."

"Yeah." She pulls away slowly, nodding along to his words but looking dazed. "Bye, Castle."

"Bye, Beckett," he parrots as she strides out of his bedroom, navigating through his office.

He swears he catches her touch her fingers to her lips before she drifts out of sight.

* * *

"You got to go to a museum?" he whines three days later, dropping his head back against one of the pillows propped under his neck. "Did you get to see the dinosaurs?"

Beckett chuckles and it's enough to elicit another groan of agitation from him.

"This sucks."

"Mm, it definitely isn't the same without you, Castle," she smirks, watching him a little too fondly while she settles beside him on the surface of his bed. She's able to find comfort in his space a little too easily for her liking these days, but she's too exhausted to overanalyze it tonight. She's always too exhausted to overanalyze it, or at least that's the excuse she continues to use on herself.

"Admit it, Beckett. You miss my expertise."

She scoffs. "If it makes you feel any better, sure. Keep telling yourself that."

Kate hands him the fruit cup she grabbed from the refrigerator on her way into his room and he huffs in disgust at the plastic little cup.

"I like it better when you make me smoothies."

"I'll make you one later tonight," she yawns, relaxing into one of the many pillows scattered across the head of the mattress and closing her eyes.

"Tired?" he murmurs, reaching over to brush the bangs back from her forehead, his calloused fingertips lingering along her hairline.

She hums in affirmation, trying to keep from dozing off as he continues his soft ministrations through her hair, combing out any tangles and soothing her with soft strokes to her scalp. She likes his hands, his broad palms and thick fingers, scorned fingertips that attest to too much typing, to countless stories told.

There are other parts of him that she likes too, like his lips, but she tries not to think too hard about that. Castle was incredibly gracious about the accidental kiss she planted to his mouth earlier that week, didn't even mention it or give her any form of a leer or smirk when she returned to the loft only hours later with his lunch. She's grateful, so grateful, but she also wants to do it again. Almost wishes he was well enough to make the pleasant beginning to her last nightmare come true.

Almost.

"Blame it on the mummy. Ryan thinks he's cursed and Esposito isn't helping," she mutters, the corner of her mouth twitching as she hears him rumble with amusement beside her.

"You know, you don't have to come sit in here with me every night when you get home, Kate."

She cracks an eye open to look at him.

Kate. It's always Kate now. Not Beckett. He hardly ever calls her Beckett anymore. And maybe that should worry her, maybe it someday would, but for now it has her heart swelling and her stomach flipping and she will always secretly enjoy the thrilling sound of her first name coming from his mouth.

But – wait, did he just say _home_?

"Don't get me wrong, I enjoy your company, but I know how exhausting your job is and that you have better things to be doing. I don't want you to feel like you're imprisoned here with me-"

"Castle," she huffs, shaking her head and effectively cutting him off. His fingers unfortunately fall away from her hair, but maybe it's better if he isn't touching her while she speaks to him about this, while she proves him wrong. "You're trapped inside all day, mostly laid up in this bed. I know how much you hate it and I…"

Her gaze slides away from him, not exactly wanting to meet his eyes as she says these things – information that will probably reveal too much. More than she already has without using words at all, that is.

"I enjoy being able to hang out with you, having dinner with you, filling you in on what you missed at the precinct. I like talking with Alexis when she gets home from school and listening to your mother discuss her latest Broadway adventures. These things… they're not hassles to me, okay?"

He still looks uncertain and she sighs. "Have you ever known me to do anything I don't want to do? Especially out of pity?"

He spares a moment of contemplation at that before his lips are turning upwards into a warm smile that is steadily becoming an all too essential part of her day. His eyes are that brilliant shade of bright blue, twinkling with happiness and something she isn't sure she wants to recognize. Not just yet.

"No, I mean – okay," he murmurs with a careful nod, his range of movement improving with each day, but still a tentative endeavor.

She smiles back at him, ready to allow her eyes some rest once more, but apparently, Castle isn't quite finished.

"But I actually wanted to ask you something."

She props her weight on her elbows. "Yeah?"

"If something were to happen to me - something worse than getting shot in the chest - I want you to watch out for Alexis. She - she looks up to you."

Beckett straightens, his words like acid spilling down her spine, and sits up on her knees. She shakes her head at him with a fierce determination to prove him wrong beating against her chest.

"Nothing's going to happen to you."

Not again.

"But if it does…" he draws out.

"Castle, you're not-"

"No one's guaranteed a tomorrow," he reminds her, reaching for the closest part of her that his outstretched hand can grasp. He slips his fingers around the back of her knee, curling his palm into the corner of bone. "You know that, so just promise me-"

"Fine," she growls, and oh, there is a part of her, flaring hot and insistent, that wants to surge forward, to decimate the smile he's giving her with her mouth, make him believe her when she says he isn't going anywhere.

"Thank you," he says, the sincerity in his voice tampering the flames. And then the moment is gone, done as he retracts his hand from her leg and extends his arm as far as he can without encountering pain in his sternum. "Come on, the drowsiness I'm feeling indicates it's time for my nap and I know you love to cuddle."

She rolls her eyes, but lowers from her knees, allowing her body to gravitate towards him. Gingerly, she situates herself along his side and folds her arm against his ribs, settling her fingers between the rungs of bones. He isn't able to curl his arm around her shoulders like she knows he wants to, but he's always content to settle for holding her hand and touching his chin to the top of her head when she rests her face to the crook of his neck.

"For the record, Kate, I don't plan to go anywhere," he murmurs into her hair and the natural tension that laced through her shoulders without her even noticing slowly begins to unravels.

She sighs and tilts her chin upwards, dusts her lips along his jaw until she can press a kiss to the quickening pulse beneath his skin. "I know you don't. I don't plan to let you. Now take your nap, Castle."


	7. Chapter 7

He's been dreaming about her, nothing necessarily new, but this is a good dream. After the Dunn case, he had constant nightmares about her dying, about Kate with a bullet in her chest instead of his. But today, he clings to the image of her in the sunlight, the sensation of her hand encased in his, the sand beneath their feet and the waves of the ocean rushing forward to greet them. The Hamptons, he'd really love to take her to the Hamptons.

"Rick."

The call of his name isn't coming from the woman in his dreams, though, staring back at him while the sea breeze whips through her hair, an image he has yet to witness in real life. Instead, the murmur of his name ripples through his senses from a voice overhead, the caress of it coaxing him towards wakefulness. Castle abandons the warmth of his imagination for the cold surface of reality. In his dreams, he can't feel the piercing throb in his chest, but awareness provides a brittle reminder of his single month of healing and the constant ache still beneath the cage of his ribs. But as long as Kate Beckett is here, it's never so bad.

"Castle, wake up."

He grunts and startles awake at the light pressure on his arm, instinctively moving his hand upwards at the sharp but familiar tug in his sternum, curving a protective hand over his wounded heart.

"Morning," the cause of his unsolicited awakening murmurs and his irritation immediately begins to recede.

"Time's it?" he mumbles instead, blinking a couple of times until his gaze on Kate is clear.

"Almost ten. You want to go for a walk with me?"

Now that his vision isn't blurred with sleep, he can see that Kate is already dressed, her hair in natural waves and a light layer of makeup on her face. Different from what he's used to, softer.

"Wait." He forces himself to go slow as he sits up, simultaneously trying to remember the correct date. He's been sleeping odd hours lately, but he's pretty sure that it's only Tuesday… "Don't you have to work today?"

"I did, but I traded with Karpowski," she shrugs. "I was reading through the papers Kritsky sent with us when you were discharged, and it mentioned you should try walking when you feel up to it, just a little every day so you can strengthen your heart again."

His lips quirk; imagining Kate upstairs in the guest bedroom reading his _What To Expect After Heart Surgery _pamphlets does funny things to his healing heart.

"But we don't have to," she adds a little too quickly, a sudden shyness he doesn't recognize falling over her features as she casts her eyes towards his bedroom door. "I just thought since you've been cooped up in the loft for so long-"

"Sounds like a perfect idea," he agrees before she can change her mind.

Kate offers him a tentative smile back and proceeds to help ease him out of bed. She doesn't try to interfere when he moves to shuffle to the bathroom on his own, his steps short and stuttering as they always tend to be in the mornings when his chest is still tight and the dull roar of pain that accompanies him daily is a little more present.

He has to remind himself not to rush as he uses the bathroom, brushes his teeth, and changes into a comfortable pair of jeans. She still has to help him with t-shirts, which is why he usually sticks to hoodies around the house.

"How long can we go?" he asks when he shuffles back out to find her waiting on his bed.

He swallows thickly at the sight of her there, like he always does. She spends a lot of time in his room, on his bed – more than he could have ever imagined and for reasons he never would have fathomed – but it still steals his breath every time he catches a glimpse of her so at home in his space.

Like she belongs.

"Well, as long as your body can take," she replies, her face purposefully blank as she looks up to see him standing there without a shirt on. "But I'm assuming maybe a half hour at most?"

Excitement bubbles beneath the tender space of his chest while Kate rises from the bed, strolling around him to walk into his closet. She returns to stand before him with a white undershirt and one of his favorite sweaters hanging on her arm.

"It's not too cold out today, so I think this will work," she murmurs, assessing the materials on her arm before she selects the undershirt and lifts on the toes of her flats – this may actually be the first time he's seen Kate Beckett wearing ballet flats – to maneuver the garment over his head.

He steadies her with his hands on her waist, chuckling when he feels the gentle startle of her spine at the contact.

"Shut up," she grumbles, tugging the shirt down his neck and dropping back to the soles of her feet.

The grin remains strung across his lips while he carefully works his arms through the sleeves and ducks his head for her this time when she holds up the cobalt sweater. But even then, she lingers, smoothing out the wrinkles in the fabric, adjusting the length so it sits comfortably around his abdomen.

"Good?" she murmurs, her fingers hovering over the memorized spot where the round scar has started to form.

Castle keeps his face neutral despite the twinge of pain the upwards motion of his arm still elicits and successfully catches her by the wrist, pressing his thumb to the rhythm of her pulse.

"Good," he confirms, releasing her wrist to encircle her hand in his, relishing in the soft hue of pink tinting the enticing flesh of her cheeks.

* * *

Thirty minutes doesn't sound too demanding and he _is_ getting stronger. He's able to walk around the loft now without any assistance, finally able to join them for dinner and complete the simple tasks on his own. No longer so painfully dependent upon those around him. And the thought of fresh air, a walk on the city sidewalks with Kate Beckett on his arm, sounds absolutely heavenly.

Well, it _did_.

Castle grunts a curse as she lowers him onto the park bench; he overdid it and they're both painfully aware. She suggested they head back to his loft ten minutes ago, but ten minutes ago he felt like he could continue on for a little while longer.

He was wrong and now his chest is burning so fiercely he can barely breathe.

"Stay here," Kate murmurs, her hand at his jaw and he spares just a second to lean into the soft cradle of her palm, her skin on his like a balm to the internal ache drumming through his chest.

She disappears a moment later. He has no idea where she intends to go, but there's nothing he can do aside from lean back into the bench and try to breathe while he waits for her to come back.

Minutes that feel like unending hours pass before he opens his eyes to witness Kate jogging back into his spotty vision, a styrofoam cup clutched in her hand.

"What's that?" he rasps, forced to keep his voice low in an attempt to use as little of his precious energy as possible.

"Protein smoothie with some iron mixed in. We passed a place on the way here, not too far back. It should help," she encourages, pressing the cup into his hand and watching expectantly as he guides the straw to his lips.

He moves his hand to her knee once she's settled beside him, squeezing the bone gently in appreciation as he sips at the strawberry banana shake. He doesn't expect her to cover his hand with her own, to twine their fingers and smooth her thumb along the bumps of his knuckles. But she does.

This is bad. He's so used to her, to this softer side of Beckett, to Kate. Her presence, her voice, her touch - all now vital parts of his daily life and he doesn't want to give her up. Once he was healed, she would be gone, back to merely tolerating him. She would be nothing more than Detective Beckett to him once again and he just doesn't know if he can go back, not after everything they've been through together in this past month alone.

He's in love with her, he's sure of that now, and he doesn't know how he's going to handle it when she proves that she most certainly does not love him back.

"Castle, what is it?" she questions in concern, her free hand hovering over his chest as if she could shield his healing bullet wound from any more potential pain. "Are you-"

"I'm fine," he murmurs, curving his lips around the clear straw and taking another small sip. There has to be a way to get over her, to move past the crushing realization that Kate will always be just out of reach. He'll figure it out and then he'll be just fine. It might take awhile, but he would be fine.

Kate's hand combs through his hair, just once, out of habit, before it drops back to aid the other in cradling his knuckles.

Maybe not.

* * *

"Hey guys, where've you been?" Alexis chirps when Castle and Beckett hobble through the door.

Castle has an arm around her, solely for support, but even once they're safely inside the loft and Kate has guided him towards the couch, he takes his time in letting her go.

"Was this a date?" he asked her on the cab ride home, teasing her despite the trepidation his own question evoked in his eyes.

But she merely rolled hers, placed her hand atop his knee while she settled against his side for the fifteen-minute trip back to the loft.

"I don't know, Castle. You sure you want to remember our first date as you collapsing on a park bench while I ditched you to find a smoothie?"

"Well, when you say it like that it sounds completely unromantic," he mused, stealing the hand on his knee to toy with her fingers, like it was so easy, so natural. And maybe it was; maybe it could just be this easy. "But you didn't _ditch _me, you ran to grab me a smoothie to help me build my energy levels back up and then sat with me on that park bench until I felt better. All while listening to me tell stories about random people in said park."

"Mm, well, when you say it like that, it doesn't sound so bad," she parroted, watching the tangle and twine of their fingers, his so thick and long and all encompassing to her slender ones.

"I'd call it a nice first date," he hummed, his chest expanding with a slow rise and fall. "The next one we go on, though, I'll be much better company."

Kate shook her head and craned her neck to kiss his cheek, just to feel the startled smile blossom to life at her touch. "Never bad company, Castle."

She never intended for this little outing to become a date and she should be berating herself for letting him think of it as one, but she still can't find the will to worry, to take it back. She doesn't _want _to and that should terrify her.

But it was a nice first date.

"We went on a walk," Castle answers Alexis, resting his hip to the arm of the sofa for support. "We didn't make it too far before I got us stranded, but-"

"He didn't get us stranded," Kate huffs, nudging his arm with her elbow as she releases him to join his daughter in the kitchen. "Just needed a break on the way back."

"No shame in taking a break, Dad," Alexis chimes in, turning the page of a textbook splayed out in front of her. "Especially when it's only been a month since you were shot."

"See?"

"It was still embarrassing," he mutters, dropping his head back against the couch once he's seated, pouting she's sure, and Kate rolls her eyes.

"What are you up to?" she asks his daughter while she opens the fridge, snagging a bowl of grapes from the middle shelf.

"Just reading the material assigned for an upcoming chemistry test," Alexis sighs, pinching the page between her thumb and forefinger.

"Did you need help?" Kate inquires, placing the bowl on the countertop, popping a green grape into her mouth.

Alexis gnaws on her bottom lip for a moment before glancing up to her.

"No, I'm not worried about the test, but there's this thing that I wanted to do and I'm - I don't know if I can and none of my friends are interested, but it's for a good cause," Alexis rambles in a low voice, her gaze flickering towards the living room, the sofa, where Kate is almost certain Castle has fallen asleep.

"Yeah? What is it you're wanting to do?"

"A marathon," Alexis murmurs, releasing the page to toy with her pencil instead. "I read about it in the paper today. It's a half marathon, thirteen miles, but it's also like a fundraiser and you can get people to sponsor you. Like a dollar a mile? I thought maybe I could do it, donate the money I raise to the hospital that treated Dad."

Oh, wow, that steals her breath for a moment, fills her chest with pride, but Alexis quickly mistakes her silence for judgment.

"But maybe I should just do something else," she dismisses with a flutter of her hand.

"No, no, that sounds like a really good idea, Alexis," Kate interjects, adjusting her voice to match Alexis's hushed volume, catching onto the notion that his daughter obviously wants this to be some sort of surprise. "I'd be willing to help in any way I can."

Relief flushes through Alexis's eyes, the nervous blue of her gaze softening to shimmering sapphire. "Actually, I could use a little help."

"I'll already pitch in for twenty bucks a mile," Kate volunteers, but Alexis shakes her head with a soft laugh.

"Thanks, Kate, but I actually meant with the training. I'm not a runner – at all – and I see you coming back from runs in the mornings before I leave for school all the time. I get that running is more of a solo sport, but is there any way you could help me build up the ability to run thirteen miles? Or at least make it to the finish line without collapsing?" Alexis adds ruefully.

"When is the marathon?"

"Not until the fall, so I have some time."

Kate chews on her lower lip, contemplating the idea of trying to train someone in something she considers nothing more than a stress-relieving hobby. But Alexis is looking at her with so much hope and expectation, all so she can raise money to honor her dad in the only way she knows how.

"I'm no pro, but I'll do the best I can to prepare you," Kate agrees and Alexis beams with happiness, lifts in her seat to stretch across the counter and wrap her arms around Kate's neck.

"Thank you so much!" she exclaims in a whisper. Beckett forces her shoulders to relax, her spine not to tense, and hooks one of her arms around the girl in return, pats her back.

"Don't thank me yet," Kate chuckles as Alexis descends back into her seat, plucking a grape from the bowl and chewing with her beaming smile still in place. "You'll probably hate me by the time the marathon rolls around."

"No way, I already owe you big time."

Kate huffs, shaking her head while she nudges the bowl of fruit closer to the edge of Alexis's textbook. "You don't owe me anything."

Alexis's gaze drifts back towards the couch, where they can both see the top of Castle's head, tipped back against the top of the sofa.

"Actually-"

"Read your chemistry book," Kate mutters, grateful to hear his daughter's laughter as she steals a handful of grapes from the bowl and strolls back into the living room, taking a careful seat beside Castle.

He stirs at the dip in the couch's cushion, his lashes fluttering and his lips quirking when he notices her.

"You should lie down in your room," she murmurs, propping her elbow atop the head of the couch, covering his fingers with her opposite hand when he extends them to rest over her knee.

"I like it here," he mumbles, his eyes closing again, but Kate squeezes his hand for attention. She motions for him to shift as painlessly as he can, lie across the length of the leather sectional rather than with his neck curved against the back of the couch at what will eventually become an uncomfortable angle.

She huffs at him when he drops his head into her lap before she can rise from the couch, grinning up at her with hazy eyes that sparkle. But she doesn't try to slip free, to redirect the weight of his skull from atop her thighs. She accepts the position all too easily, stretching over him to snag the book she'd left on the coffee table earlier that week, sinking back into the sofa once the novel is open in one hand, the other thoughtlessly cradling the top of his head.

"Okay, now I like it even better."

"Take your nap, Castle."

Alexis snickers from the kitchen, but Castle is already drifting back to sleep beneath the soft ministrations of her fingers tracing mindless circles along the surface of his scalp.

Not a bad first date at all.


	8. Chapter 8

Castle grumbles in frustration as he pushes himself out of bed and slowly makes his way towards the front door, where someone is knocking pretty damn insistently on the other side.

It's late afternoon, but Kate isn't home yet and Alexis is over at Paige's for the evening, working on a project for her chemistry class. He isn't sure where his mother could be, but he wouldn't mind her residing in the loft this evening if it meant there would be someone else here to answer the door instead of the recovering gunshot victim.

Finally, with gritted teeth, Rick pulls open the door and is instantly disgruntled by the eagerness of the woman on the other side. He can't place her, but she does have a familiar face…

"Richard Castle?" she says his name with a dazzling, well-practiced smile. "I'm Ellie Monroe, we were going to be on that late night talk show with Bobby Mann this week?"

Oh… oh yeah, he forgot all about that. He remembers talking with Paula on the phone earlier in the month and listening to her confirm and complain about all the appearances she had to cancel for him, but that still doesn't explain why Ellie Monroe is currently on his doorstep.

When he says nothing in return, Ellie continues on without missing a beat. "I had really been looking forward to meeting you, Rick, and when I found out you wouldn't be able to make it, I just _had_ to come see you," Ellie Monroe tells him a little too sweetly.

He just woke up from a really great nap, restful and painless for once, littered with dreams of Kate and walking without issue, and the woman on his doorstep is gorgeous – a beloved movie actress, if he's remembering the profession behind her name correctly – but not even she can hold his attention while there are traces of a deep slumber still coursing through his system.

"Well, that's very kind, Ms. Monroe, but I'm-"

"Oh, please, call me Ellie," she insists, dropping her hand to his arm and smoothing a freshly manicured thumb along the line of his wrist.

"Well-"

"Castle?"

He glances over Ellie's shoulder to see Kate striding down his hallway, a look of… oh, is that _jealousy_ clouding her features as soon as she notices the actress at his door holding onto his arm?

"Kate," he breathes out, a little too relieved. "This is Ellie Monroe. She stopped by to…" He glances down at the woman, not exactly sure _why_ she's here to begin with. "Check on me?"

"And discuss some casting opportunities," she adds, her smile fading the closer Beckett grows in her march towards them.

Castle watches in barely hidden amazement as Kate's eyes narrow, steadily becoming ablaze with suspicion. And then she's stepping forward, inserting herself between him and Ellie Monroe with ease, and slipping an arm around Castle's waist. She's ushering him inside before the actress has the chance to utter a single protest.

"Well, it was very kind of you to stop by, Ms. Monroe, but Mr. Castle here is recovering from a very serious injury. So I suggest you get into contact with his agent if you would like to talk business."

"But I-"

"Have a good night."

Kate shuts the door on the indignant actress and shakes her head, her arm still tight and possessive around his back.

"I can't believe she would actually come over here and try to _seduce_ you for a role in the Nikki Heat movie." He listens to her mutter in disbelief, mourning the loss of her when she moves away from his side to step out of her heels. "Especially while you're still recovering. Where is her _dignity_? Her human decency? Her self-"

"You were jealous," he states, blurts, wincing to himself as the words tumble out gracelessly with an embarrassingly awestruck quality clinging to each syllable. He really didn't meant to voice the internal realization aloud, but it's too late now and she's spinning around to stare at him like a deer caught in headlights.

But Kate Beckett is a master when it comes to regaining her composure with lightning speed.

"Jealous? Of the actress who wants to sweet talk you into casting her as Nikki Heat?" she scoffs, binding her arms across her chest. "Hardly."

Castle rests his hip against the kitchen counter, doesn't try to stop the smirk from spreading along his lips.

"Sure looked like jealousy to me, Beckett. Unless you just can't stand the idea of a beautiful actress being interested in me."

"Why would I care?" she scoffs, but ooh, her voice has sharpened ever so slightly and he totally just hit a nerve. Because she does care, quite a bit by the sounds of it.

"That's a good question, why _would _you care?" he challenges. But she's already revealed more than she intended and she's not going to give him any more evidence to work with than she already has.

She narrows her gaze on him and walks into the kitchen like a panther, smooth and dangerous, heading straight for the refrigerator and ignoring his eyes on her. "Are hallucinations listed as a side effect to your medication?"

"It's nothing to be ashamed of. You're cute when you get jealous. Actually, no, _hot_. Hot is the adjective I was looking for."

He can't see her face, but he has a feeling her cheeks are burning by the way she purposely keeps her profile shielded by the stainless steel door of the fridge.

"I was not jealous, Castle," she announces, striding up to him with a protein shake in hand. Her eyes flick down to his lips, lingering there, and can she _not_ look at him like that when he cannot properly reciprocate? "I'm _protective_."

He arches an eyebrow, but she merely pushes the shake into his grasp and shoots him a grin over her leather-clad shoulder as she heads for the stairs.

"Protecting what's yours then?" he muses, her grin shifting into a glare, but she continues up the stairs without answering, without correcting him.

Oh yeah, whether she wants to admit it or not, she totally has him and he has no problem accepting that.

* * *

She's still kicking herself for her little show of jealousy, her multiple slips of the tongue, when she comes back down the stairs half an hour later, clean from a shower and dressed in a freshly washed t-shirt and yoga pants.

God, she basically _claimed_ him and he isn't even hers.

Kate scans the first floor, unable to locate him in the kitchen or the living room, but a distinct clacking noise is filtering through the air, guiding her towards the study to find him sitting in his office chair with a couple of pillows at his back, propping him up, and his fingers flying across the keyboard.

"Castle?"

His eyes flicker up from the screen to see her, the corners crinkling as they sweep down to her casual loungewear, as if he hasn't seen her dressed down too many times to count within the past couple of months.

"Hey," he returns, snapping his gaze back to his laptop. "Alexis is going to be a little late, so I was going to order in. Preference?"

"Uh, no," Kate murmurs, drifting into the room and coming around his desk. "Are you writing?"

"Yeah," he beams, hardly even noticing her slow approach towards the back of his chair. "I had to get this scene out."

Kate squints to read from over his shoulder, attempting to distinguish the words racing across the document as he types, skimming through the scene, and - and gasping as she realizes exactly what he's writing.

"You can't write about that," she protests, reaching for his laptop, but Castle quickly saves his work, spins away from her in his chair. "And definitely not with that kind of outcome."

"Too steamy for you, Detective? I've never heard any complaining from you about my sex scenes in the past, not since I found you hiding out with _Heat Wave_ in the woman's bathroom-"

"I hate you," she hisses, her cheeks on fire as he laughs at her, still foiling her attempts at stealing his laptop by catching her hand, trapping it in his.

"Come on, it's not that bad. And just like in the other two books, no one is going to know-"

"I'll know and _she'll _know-"

"Kate, if she doesn't think we're sleeping together after that little display of… what was it? _Protectiveness_? Then I definitely wouldn't be worrying about what she thinks of some fictional smut."

Beckett groans and snatches her hand back from his grasp.

"Castle, no one wants to read about Rook being seduced by some sleazy actress trying to sleep her way into whatever business propaganda she came here looking for."

"Oh, is that what Ellie was going to do?" he muses, closing the lid of his laptop and hugging it to his chest when she attempts another swipe for the device. "Try and seduce the gunshot victim into bed?"

She huffs her frustration, because he's grinning up at her so smug and satisfied with himself as he turns his chair back towards her, leaning back into the plush leather and pillows until she's practically standing between his knees.

"Got a problem with some other woman trying to crawl into my bed, Beckett?"

He's taking it too far, even if he's just teasing her, and he knows it, staring up at her with laughter in his eyes and testing just how much she'll let him say, how far she'll actually let him go, before shutting him down. She knows better, she's already taken the bait one too many times today, but the idea of that woman – any woman that is not _her_ – taking up space in his sheets ignites something hot and scorching in her chest that had never been there before.

Protective, yeah right.

"Spot's already taken," she growls, her stomach bottoming out as his eyebrows hitch high enough to reach his hairline.

"Oh, is it?" he hums, toying with her, so she merely crosses her arms over her chest, arches an eyebrow in response. She doesn't expect most of his amusement to dissipate so quickly, for him to look up at her with sincerity shimmering so clearly in his bright eyes. "I think it's a given that I don't want anyone else in my bed, Kate."

She tucks a strand of hair behind her ear, wills her skin to cool from the flush heating beneath the surface.

"Nothing she could have said before you showed up would have changed that, you know," he adds, as if she needs the reassurance, but she doesn't. There's nothing to reassure her about.

Is there?

Castle shifts to place his laptop back on his desk, knocks his knees against her outer thighs as he braces his hands against the armrests of the chair, heaves himself into a standing position with a deep breath.

"Kate."

Her gaze falls to his mouth, caresses the seam of his lips, and her heart picks up at the knowledge that he's leaning in closer, the intent to kiss her clear and buzzing through her veins.

_Protecting what's yours?_

"Yeah," she murmurs, eager to do more than protect, desperate to claim, because yes, he is most definitely hers.

She doesn't stop him when his hand is draping at her hip, the other rising to cup her jaw, his thumb skimming her cheek. She finally lifts her gaze, meets the scorch of blue staring back at her.

"Castle-"

"Dad, I'm home!" The call of Alexis's voice and the slam of the closing door resounds through the apartment. Kate immediately places her hands to his tender chest, palm over the scar above his heart. "Some woman named Ellie left a business card on your doorstep."

He chuckles softly and drops his hand from her face, releases her hip with a regretful squeeze, but she isn't ready for the moment to pass. She has no idea what they're doing, what she's _thinking_-

Except that she's not.

"You think you're mine, Castle?" she muses with a quirk of her brow, the spill of an indulgent smile on her lips. Sure enough, he falters, swallows hard and glances down to her mouth.

"I'm - um, I'd say so." His chest puffs out with pride, delicate and wounded and still resting beneath her palm. "Enough yours to expect your spot in the bed to remain empty when you're not here."

Kate bites her bottom lip, her heart fluttering with nerves, but the foreign giddiness cascading through her ribs is far more prominent. They're not dating, not together, but apparently, they're exclusive.

"Good."

"In the study, Pumpkin," he calls back before his daughter can come searching, descending carefully back into his chair, the amusement dancing in his eyes once more and merging with the simmering delight. "And yeah, Kate already took care of that."

Alexis appears in the doorway with one of her eyebrows curving upwards with intrigue. "Oh?"

Kate shrugs, takes it in stride, but still flicks her fingers to his shoulder. "Just keeping your dad's best interests at heart."

"When it comes to gold-digging actresses who sleep with directors for roles?" Alexis snickers and Beckett's brow hitches.

"You knew that already?"

"Duh. Ellie Monroe is _always _being dragged for that online," Alexis mutters with a roll of her eyes.

"I didn't know that," Castle gasps from his chair. "I'm so lucky you swooped in to save me in time, Beckett."

"This must have been some rescue," Alexis muses, her gaze jumping back and forth between them. But Kate can't tell whether it's elation or hesitation she's reading in the girl's sparkling blue eyes.

"Oh, it was. Kate is _protective_," Castle preens. Beckett merely huffs, strides forward to hook her arm around Alexis's shoulders. Rick laughs while Alexis grins up at her with that same smugness her father wears so well.

"Whatever he means by that," Alexis starts, strolling with Kate towards the kitchen to begin preparing dinner. "I'm glad for it."

She releases her loose hold on Alexis to step towards the fridge, stalling with her fingers curled around the cool chrome of the door handle. "You are?"

"Kate," Alexis calls, a knowing look in her gaze and a small smile on her lips that makes her look so much older, wiser, than fifteen. "The last thing I want is another bimbo trying to use my dad for her own gain. I can't always… I look after him, but sometimes it's not my place or I'm just not around. So I'm glad you are."

It's not Alexis's job to look after her father. It's not Kate's either, certainly not her place, but if she can soothe Alexis's worry for her dad just by being here, especially after becoming the most prominent reason to cause the girl concern, she'll accept it, honor it.

After spending so much time with him, here in his home, she has admittedly learned to understand the fear Alexis holds for her dad, for his heart, all too well. It may have been jealousy earlier, but at the root of it all, protecting Castle's heart is something Beckett wants as well. Even if it means protecting it from herself.

"I'm glad I am too."

Alexis's smile grows and she nods towards the fridge. "Good, now let's start dinner and then maybe we can talk about my training schedule for the marathon."


	9. Chapter 9

Kate's been working late all week, not arriving home until the darkness has settled deep in the sky, lulling him into a sleep that he can't fight no matter how hard he tries.

Sometimes, she comes to check on him after the distinct click of the front door locking wakes him in the night, slipping into his room and tiptoeing towards his bed with her heels hanging from her fingertips. But she never stays, not like she did that single night nearly three weeks ago, when she fell asleep in his bed after he's certain a nightmare dragged her downstairs to ensure his survival with the physical proof of his existence.

It's placed him in a brooding mood throughout these last few days, the consistent stretches of loneliness wearing him thin. Of course, his mother drops in, far less frequently now, but still enough that he sees her at least twice a week, and Alexis is around at times, but his days are mostly spent alone. Evenings that were once filled with Kate lounging in his room or on the couch, in his kitchen or at the table during dinner, hollowed out by her vacancy.

He's being selfish, he knows that too. It's been a week and he's aware that the case she's working has her drained, that the triple homicide has the Twelfth's resources damn near exhausted and she's desperately needed. He doesn't doubt she'll bring the killer to justice before the FBI has to step in, before another innocent person falls victim to the sadistic murderer on a spree in their city, but for now, he misses her, worries about her, and falls into the habit of drifting to sleep with his lips in a frown.

He's supposed to be her backup.

Tonight is the fifth night in a row that he hasn't seen her aside from the quick breakfast she shared with him that morning. He doesn't expect that to change, is already hoping he'll have better luck tomorrow, when he hears her enter his room.

He keeps his eyes closed, more out of instinct than anything, and listens to her bare feet pad softly on his floor. They draw closer to his bed until she's at his side, hovering her fingers at his chest. They graze his heart, her palm a warm weight that settles over the site of his bullet wound.

Castle opens his eyes, finds hers dark like midnight and surrounded by lines of exhaustion that wear deep into her skin.

"Beckett." They rise to see him, not surprised by his wakefulness. Rick lifts his hand from his side to cover hers, circle his thumb at her wrist. "Close the case?"

She nods, but her lips are pursed, and… oh, the case was closed, but she didn't achieve the kind of conclusion she was hoping for. By the look in her eyes, justice was somehow lost or compromised under the veil of being gained.

"Crawl in."

"No," she rasps, clears her throat, and scrapes a hand through the straightened length of her hair. "I should-"

"Kate," he sighs, using his loose grip on her hand to tug, using her first name to persuade. "We can talk about it, talk about something else, I've missed talking to you."

She shoots him an apologetic look that he doesn't want, but then something light sparks in her eyes, gentle but illuminating.

"Or we can not talk at all."

He gasps, just to watch her lips spread into that mischievous smile he's always loved, and releases her hand. "Katherine Beckett-"

"Don't start," she groans, dropping her shoes to the rug that stretches along the floor beneath the bed and leaving him to circle the foot of the mattress.

She approaches her side and shrugs off her jacket. The sight of victory.

"Technically, you started it with that implicating statement," he points out, internally rejoicing as her knee dips into the mattress, the rest of her body following. "Do you want to borrow some clothes?"

Kate shakes her head and descends onto her side above the blankets, still quite close to him, though. Closer than he expected.

"Just going to stay for a little while," she murmurs, her elbow stabbing into the pillow she often claims and palm pressed to her cheek.

"Uh huh, don't be mad at me if you end up falling asleep and being late tomorrow."

"Won't be late tomorrow, don't have to work," she quips, reaching forward with her free hand and combing her fingers through his hair.

He turns into the touch, doesn't question it, even though he wants to. He could so easily ruin this moment by asking the question that's been on his mind since she nearly let him kiss her in his office last week.

_What are we doing, Beckett?_

No, _Kate_. He likes it so much better when he calls her Kate.

"Good, you deserve a break," he replies instead, subtly attempting to shift a little closer to her, his side nearly bordering the front of her body.

She hums, grazes her nails to his scalp before laying her hand to rest at the side of his neck, her arm draped along his clavicle. The weight so soft and warm, heavenly. "How are you?"

"Better every day," he murmurs, his usual answer, but it's true. Mostly. "You?"

The corners of her mouth twitch, the closest thing to a true smile he'll likely receive tonight, but then Kate is folding her elbow beneath her and lowering her body to lie next to his. Her cheek touches his shoulder, her lips grazing the material of his t-shirt, hot breath burning through the fabric to sear his skin when she sighs.

"Tired," she whispers.

He feels her lashes fluttering closed and turns his face towards her. His chin fits to the top of her head, nestling against her crown. "Sleep, Kate."

"Stay just for a little while," she mumbles, her fingers hooking at the collar of his t-shirt, loose but secure, and this is far from the Kate Beckett he's grown to know in the past year, but he embraces her, this soft woman curling at his side and breathing out a steady rhythm against his shoulder.

"Stay," he echoes, but she's already asleep.

* * *

She's not there when he wakes up, eagerly casting bleary eyes to the empty space beside him, and he curses himself, his traitorous body, for sleeping in, for missing the moment she woke to leave. Castle sighs and drops his head back into the pillow, stares up at the ceiling, the wisps of sleep still lingering along the edges of his mind.

He could drift back to sleep so easily, and it's still early, only… well, eight a.m. was hardly early by Beckett's standards, but he still has the excuse of recovery to use. But just as he resigns himself to another hour of rest, the sound of the lock to the front door, the noise of multiple footsteps and soft laughter, has him doing his best to shift into a proper sitting position.

He knows Alexis's laugh like the back of his hand, has learned the accompanying laughter just as well. What he doesn't know is why Kate and Alexis left and why so early.

But beneath the building questions and curiosity, the warm sensation of hearing two of his favorite people bonding has him forcing his body towards the edge of the bed so he can investigate what's going on, witness his daughter and his… his partner (good enough for now) exchanging chatter and amusement.

Castle grits his teeth as he stands, the stiffness in his chest that greets him each morning less prominent, but still very much alive, and begins his slow shuffle towards the office.

Only to nearly collide with Kate a moment later.

"Castle," she gasps, catching him by the biceps and doing her best to steady him.

Rick blinks and clutches at her elbows, glances down, and immediately recognizes where his daughter and Beckett must have gone that morning. The questions bubble to his lips, the accompanying curiosities, but his sleep-addled brain is quite dazed by the sight of Kate in workout gear.

"Wow," he murmurs, hands involuntarily trailing from her arms to her waist, splaying across the small of her back, and the most surprising part of all – she lets him, lets him touch and explore for a split second before forcing him away.

"Hey, don't, I'm all sweaty," she huffs, swatting at his hands and stepping out of his grasp.

He has seen Kate Beckett dressed for a run before, she's gone on plenty since she started living here, but that doesn't stop his body from reacting to the view of her glimmering with sweat and still breathing hard. Her hair is pulled back into a collapsing ponytail and her bangs repressed with bobby pins, her upper body is sheathed in a fitted tank top and her legs in athletic shorts that skim too high on her thighs. It may be his new favorite look for her.

"You didn't get my note?" Kate asks, dragging him from his slow perusal of her figure, but it's so hard to concentrate when her skin is glistening and wet and all he can think about is putting his mouth to- "_Castle."_

"A note? No, I just woke up."

Her eyebrows arch in surprise, some teasing igniting in her gaze. "Wow, I thought you would have woken up while we were gone. We left at around six."

"For what?" he asks dumbly, but he's slowly emerging from the haze, trying to think about his daughter in the next room, doing something in the kitchen by the sounds of it.

"Training for the marathon Alexis told you about," she reminds him and oh, yeah, he remembers that. Kate was spending an hour or two in the afternoon with Alexis in the gym downstairs, typically on the treadmill. "Today was nice and I figured a change of scenery would be good for her."

"Yeah," he agrees, pointlessly really, because he's never ran a marathon in his life, not able to think too far past the fact that Kate wants what's good for his daughter, likes spending time with her.

"Castle," she chuckles, fingers grazing his hips. "You okay?"

"Mm, you're just really great," he sighs, wistful and dreamy, wanting. "Great to me, my kid-"

"Shh," she murmurs, surprising him with the sway of her body towards him, the nudge of her nose to his cheek. "She makes it easy. So do you. Now, come on, Lex is making smoothies."

She's stepping out of his grasp before he can act on the incessant urge to kiss her.

* * *

Kate combs her fingers through his hair while he sleeps, a habit she needs to stop indulging, one she's never even had before, not with anyone else. But she enjoys watching the peaceful swell of blue flood his eyes every time she does it, the flutter of his lashes as he fruitlessly tries to fight the slumber the touch tends to coax him towards.

She's been lounging in Castle's room since she arrived home from work a couple of hours ago, filling him in on their latest case, listening to his input, until eventually he succumbed to the exhaustion physical therapy always drenches him in. It's become their usual routine since she went back to work, and a lot of the time, she has to keep herself from falling asleep on her side of his bed. Or worse, carefully curled against him.

Her fingers finally abandon his hair, trickle down to trail along the side of his face, grazing the frown still eliciting lines around his mouth. She traces the curve of unhappiness, kinda hates herself for putting it there. Though, it really hadn't been intentional.

He loves hearing about the cases he's missing out on, even if it fills him with remorse to be stuck at home, but she learned today that he _doesn't _love hearing how the newest – temporary – member to their team had aided in solving the case of Esposito's formerly dead partner.

"You _sparred _with him?"

She rolled her eyes at the put out look claiming his face, the pure betrayal that was far too overdramatic, and toed off her shoes by the end of the bed, took a seat by his knee.

"Yeah, so? What's the big deal, Castle? I actually think you and Demming would get along well," she mused, but Rick scoffed, the disgust tugging at the corners of his mouth and pulling down harder.

"Sure, the guy swoops in, spars with you – something I have only ever _dreamed _of doing – and solves the case, now he's out for drinks with the boys, who have only visited me _twice_ since I've been cooped up here-"

"Are you seriously that jealous?" she huffed, narrowing her gaze on him, but he wasn't quick to deny it. She curled her fingers at his shin. "Castle, no one's replacing you. You know that, right?"

He hummed, noncommittally and disbelieving, so she shifted on the bed to sit against the headboard beside him.

"Would it make you feel better if we had a sparring session once you've completed physical therapy?" she bargained and the way his face lit up assured her that they were okay.

But watching him look so distressed, even in his sleep, has her doubting that now, has her planning another day to take him out, take him by the precinct to see the boys and everyone else.

"Kate?"

Beckett lifts her head at the whisper of her name to see Alexis standing hesitantly in the doorway. The girl bites her lip expectantly and Kate gingerly rises from Castle's bed without waking him. She silently proceeds to follow after Alexis when she starts towards the office, shutting the bedroom door behind them.

Alexis continues into the living room without saying a word and takes a seat on the couch, a contemplative look on her face while she tangles her fingers in her lap and waits for Kate to join her.

"Is everything okay?"

"Oh, yeah, everything's fine," Alexis assures her quickly, her nerves palpable and easily transferring over to Beckett as she settles in the lounge chair a few feet away. "Sorry, I figured you'd fallen asleep like – like always, but I just wanted to talk to you about something."

"Alright," Kate nods in encouragement, forcing her hands to remain still even though the strong urge to mimic Alexis and fidget threatens to persist.

"At the hospital, when we were in the waiting room, you said it was your fault Dad was shot."

Kate swallows hard, momentarily glancing away, but she had a feeling this conversation would be coming up sooner or later. She might as well face the music now, own up to her mistakes from that day.

"Yes, Alexis, I will always take full responsibility for that. I know I should have-"

"No, that's just it. I don't _want_ you to take the blame. It wasn't your fault."

Kate meets Alexis's suddenly determined gaze, but she isn't sure how to respond. Alexis has shown no dislike nor cast any fault upon her since the shooting, but with situations like these, someone always takes the blame. She just assumed that Alexis would view her as the person who deserved it most.

Kate herself certainly thought so, despite Castle's constant reminders of her lack of fault.

"You didn't shoot him, Kate," Alexis continues, a familiar reassurance softening her voice and lightening her eyes, just like her father's. "And you shouldn't keep feeling like you did. Gram and I... we're _grateful _for you."

"Grateful?" Beckett echoes in confusion, incredulity, because really, what more had she done than turn all of their lives upside down?

Alexis nods, a small but still tentative smile adorning her lips. "You've been good for Dad. I mean, I never stopped worrying about him being in danger, but ever since he started shadowing you, he's been happier, you know? He writes more, he has something to look forward to everyday, and he – he has you. I really think you… I _know_ you make him happy. More than anyone else ever has before."

Kate knows she's blushing, her cheeks growing hot even as she tries to quell the mixture of embarrassment and flattery the girl's words elicit. But it means a lot coming from Alexis, his daughter; it means everything. She didn't have the chance to know the girl very well before she temporarily moved into the loft, only seeing her on a few occasions and never having the opportunity to discuss much for long, but she's always hoped she would gain the approval from his daughter that she didn't even realize she's been seeking.

"You've seen it haven't you?" Alexis retrieves her from her spiraling train of thought with the question. "How he's changed since he started following you?"

"I - yeah, I suppose," Kate answers reluctantly. But it's true, isn't it? He has changed from over a year ago when he walked smug and self-assured into her precinct, forcing his way into her life like he had the right to just because he had the connections.

He could still be a wiseass at times, still has the ability to drive her crazy and indulge the urge to throw him in a holding cell some days, but that isn't the case so often anymore. Before he was shot, she actually fell into the habit of looking forward to seeing him in the mornings, enjoyed having his company at a crime scene and after hours when she was the only one left on the homicide floor.

And ever since the Dick Coonan case - when he was so willing to do whatever he could to help put her mother's case to bed, and then brought her every comfort food imaginable when it all fell through - she could even admit that she cared about him as more than a coworker, a friend. She was able to recognize that the moment he volunteered to bow out and stop shadowing her, when her heart seized almost painfully at the thought of him bowing out of her life.

And now, after nearly losing him in an entirely different way, she can admit it to herself and probably even Castle someday soon, that she cared. She cares a lot.

"Will you leave, once he's better?" Alexis inquires, her brow knit in concern, her eyes shimmering with apprehension.

"I have to find a place eventually, Alexis," Kate murmurs with a soft smile, sitting forward and reaching for the girl's twisting fingers before her doubt can grow. "But that doesn't mean I'm going to disappear. I'm just… not quite ready to move in any time soon."

Alexis's brows skyrocket to her hairline, tugging the corners of her mouth up along with them. Beckett huffs.

"You are your father's daughter," she chuckles, releasing Alexis's hand to lean back in her seat, but his daughter is all smiles now.

"He'll totally get you to move in by the end of next year, I'm calling it now."

Her heart stumbles, her mouth goes dry, and Kate does her best to formulate sentences. "Alexis, we aren't even - I'm not - we're just-"

Alexis lifts her hands in supplication and rises from the couch, her lips still curved in a pleased grin.

"Whatever you say, Kate," she sing-songs, sauntering into the kitchen to check the oven, where the likely source of the mouth-watering garlic and sauce aroma lies. "Dinner should be ready soon if you want to wake Dad, give him some time to loosen up since he always gets so stiff after his naps."

Beckett swallows, standing automatically with her gaze drifting towards the office entryway. "Yeah, good idea."

It's far too soon for her to even begin freaking out about moving in. She and Castle aren't even together. Are they?

* * *

Rick is already awake, scrubbing at his jaw when Kate walks into his bedroom, her face lacking color and her fingers twitching at her sides.

"What's wrong?" he asks immediately, clearing his throat of the residual sleep lingering from the unwanted nap he gave in to after she returned home.

Her mouth opens, closes, and then she's shaking her head, dragging a hand through her hair. "Nothing. Dinner will be ready soon."

"You sure?"

"Yeah, Alexis said it's almost-"

"No," he huffs, scratching at his throat, the stubble that's grown too thick for his liking. "I meant you."

Her face softens by a fraction, some of that strange anxiety dissolving, and Kate nods. "I'm fine. Problem, Castle?"

His hand pauses at his neck, fingers tripping back down to his side as he notices her studying him with her lips quirked and her head cocked ever so slightly.

"Just not used to this much facial hair," he grumbles, shifting towards the edge of the bed to swing his legs over, shaking the last of the lingering ache from his morning session of physical therapy, the grogginess of his nap. "I need to shave."

"I don't know, I kinda like it," she muses, snagging her bottom lip with her teeth and raking her eyes along his face, sending a fierce arrow of heat through his abdomen.

"Don't toy with me, Beckett. It's cruel," he sighs, relishing in her grin of amusement.

She drifts after him into the bathroom, watching from the doorway as he retrieves his razor, the shaving cream. He pauses before he can go any further. He can do it himself, can practically lift his arms above his head without issue now. Shaving his face and neck should be effortless, but… physical therapy days leave him feeling so weak and useless, his arms already trembling at the thought of holding them up and steady for an extended period of time.

"Rick," she calls, meeting his eyes in the mirror. "Want some help?"

He sighs his defeat, no point in arguing, and makes room for her in front of the sink, lets her sit him down on the closed toilet seat with a towel draped across his clavicles and lather his face in the white foam.

"Just – don't maim my beautiful face," he warns, grinning at her scoff.

"I won't, no more than you have already," she mutters, arching her eyebrow with the reminder. Because yeah, he may have tried to shave on his own before he was properly able use his upper body.

She helped him apply the band-aids to the nicks that were scattered across his skin.

"Touché, Detective."

Kate smirks and raises the blade to his cheek. She wastes no time hesitating before she slowly draws it down the expanse of skin until she reaches the hinge of his jaw and has to stretch towards the sink, running the razor beneath the water to rid the blades of foam and the remnants of hair.

It almost surprises him how skillful she is with the razor blade, but she shaves the skin of his face with the same attentive determination he's seen her apply to everything. The only difference this time being the intimacy of the act, the way it blooms between them with every stroke of the blade followed by her thumb to the clean shaven flesh, every unnecessary graze of her fingers to his shoulder, every caress to his ear.

His own fingers grow restless after a while and lift to splay at her waist, curling at her hips while she's rinsing the blade, feeling her startle just slightly at the touch. But she fails to dislodge his hands, simply continues to work at his face with her eyes alight and sprinkled in gold.

"You okay?" she murmurs while she's shaving the center of his chin, the whorl of her thumb imprinting on the corner of his mouth, apparently able to feel that he's barely breathing.

She smells like coffee and cherries, like spice and vanilla. Combined with the heat of her skin colliding with his, touching his bottom lip with such ease, none of the reservation he's come to associate her with. He has to remind himself to exhale the intoxicating aroma of Kate Beckett so close.

"Better than," he quips, drumming his fingers at her sides, toying with the hem of her button down while she cleans the blade once more, earning the arch of her brow.

"Stop enjoying this so much."

"Can't help it," he grins, feeling bold and drawing her just a little further into the embrace of his parted knees. Kate glares at him, but again, she doesn't dismiss the weight of his hands on her waist or roll her eyes when his can't help but stare up at her.

"There," she breathes as she glides the blade to one final spot below his jaw, stepping back from her spot between his knees to allow him to stand and examine her handiwork in the mirror with a proud gleam in her gaze.

"Wow," he murmurs, touching his own fingertips to the clean skin, so glad to be rid of the near beard he'd been growing. "I shouldn't be surprised you're good at this too."

Kate chuckles at his side, her hip bumping his as she rinses off the blade for a final time, hands him his aftershave.

"Glad to be of service," she murmurs, placing his razor on the bathroom counter and resting back against the edge, quite shamelessly… checking him out? "I did it for my dad once too. While he was in the hospital for alcohol poisoning. It wasn't – a great shave, but at least he was more comfortable."

His chest tightens as her eyes flicker to the floor, a hint of sorrow swirling through her face. Castle thoughtlessly reaches for her wrist, grazing his thumb to the strap of the watch adorning it.

_This is for the life that I saved._

"I'm glad you saved it," she mumbles, his hand falling away from her wrist when she flips her palm, collides her fingers with his. "I owe you."

"You don't owe me anything," he answers, probably a bit too quickly. Kate's eyes ascend from beneath the curtain of her lashes to see him. "You really don't. I don't ever want you to feel like you're indebted to me."

"We already talked about this," she reminds him, flexing her fingers to fit between the spaces of his, twining loosely. "I'm not here to pay a debt."

"Then why…" His mouth snaps shut and her hand goes still in his, the tension tangling through her bones, and he could kick himself, but he just – he doesn't want to push her, he just wants to understand what this is, what they are.

And if she'll still be here once he's fully healed.

"Why what?" she picks up, but her voice is unsteady and she won't meet his eyes this time.

Castle sighs and stares down at their hands, the tentative hold that could break any minute.

"You think I'm going to walk out the door the second you're better," she assesses before he can even begin to explain it.

"I don't want you to," is all he can manage, his lungs feeling strangled, his fractured heart pounding hard enough to ache. "I just – want to know where we stand, Kate. That's all."

"Partners," she says easily, the word rushing out on an exhale. "We're partners."

"Partners," he echoes, tightening his grip on her hand when he feels hers going slack. "Partners who share a bed, who kiss-"

"That was one time and it was an accident," she mutters, tugging her hand out of his and glaring up at him with a fire igniting in her eyes, reminding him of the night her apartment lit the city sky with flames.

"Partners who aren't allowed to see other people, who are _protective_," he growls, claiming her hips once more, unwilling to give up the contact now, thumbs digging into the sharp bones.

Kate crosses her arms over her chest, but doesn't shove him away, even as she purses her lips and squares her jaw.

"You can see whomever you want," she snaps and if she's a fire, he's an inferno, because the idea of _her_ seeing someone else has him burning with jealousy.

"I don't want anyone else," he shoots back. "And you know that. I wanted you before I got shot and I want you even more now, Kate."

Her breath stutters, the fold of her arms nearly bumping his chest, but he isn't letting this go, refuses to back off now.

"I am _more _than a partner, more than a friend," he states, letting her go to allow her the space he knows she needs, the chance to process his words without panic. If that's even possible. "You've been living with me for over two months, hanging out with my daughter in your spare time, with me, and I - I want you in my home, in my bed, long after I'm recovered."

"Castle," she whispers, surprising him with the sway of her body towards him, the drop of her forehead to his collarbone, the brief moment of reprieve.

"Kate," he sighs, pleads, in response, his cheek to her temple, lips at her ear. "This – it doesn't have to mean anything right now. Just… stay."

But it's only the calm before the storm.

"I need – I have to go. For a walk."

"Kate," he whispers softly, wincing through the strain of raising his hands to her shoulders, cupping the rounded edges of bones in his palms. "Don't walk away from me, not when I can't chase after you."

But she's shaking her head, the pale line of her throat rippling as she steps back, away from him.

"I just need to think." That's what he's afraid of. "I'll come back, Castle."

She abandons him in the bathroom, his skin cold from where her hands touched. He doesn't know if he can believe her.


	10. Chapter 10

Kate walks for a long time, hands in the pockets of her jacket, the scent of shaving cream still clinging to her nose, the warmth of his hands on her waist a prominent memory in the chill of the night, his prints branded on the skin beneath her t-shirt.

His voice still ringing through her ears, soft and raw, and pleading for her to just stay. Alexis's assessment still humming in the back of her mind.

_You've seen it haven't you? How he's changed since he started following you?_

It wasn't necessarily a secret that Castle has always been attracted to her, how he cared about her – even Jordan Shaw, the FBI agent who spent a mere few days with them, picked up on that simple yet oh so complicated fact.

None of this – his daughter's approval, their moment in the bathroom, the ease that came with the intimacy – should surprise her. And yet, the foreign flutter of her heart, so strong in its intensity that it had robbed her of breath, when he confessed to wanting her, has her fleeing as quickly (and unfairly) as possible.

_Don't walk away from me when I can't chase after you._

And hasn't she secretly always wanted that, a man who would be willing to chase after her? Will Sorenson was the most serious relationship of her life and he was only willing to allow _her_ to chase after _him_, accepted her refusal with too much understanding, and let her go without a fight.

Castle, though… he would never let her go, not if she let him have her.

And she has been, slowly letting him have her, piece by piece throughout these last two months, maybe even a while before that. He redeemed himself for his betrayal last summer, for going behind her back and inadvertently ripping her to shreds with the reopening of her mother's case, was there for her in the precinct bathroom when he found her on the verge of a panic attack after she was forced to shoot Coonan.

"I'm so sorry," he whispered, kneeling beside her on the floor next to the sink, cupping her trembling shoulder in his broad palm, stroking the harsh bone with his thumb. "I'm so sorry, Kate. I'm sorry."

But she never blamed him for Coonan's death, despite the guilt that claimed his eyes, accompanied him back to the precinct later that day when he offered to stop shadowing her. Something she would have given anything for a year ago.

Not then, though, and not now. She can't lose him now.

Kate pauses at the crosswalk, waiting with a handful of other pedestrians headed to dinners or meetings or home. She doesn't want to lose him, to give up this tentative thing that has blossomed between them throughout his recovery, her stay at the loft.

He managed to get himself shot for her. And she left him with questions and heartache in his eyes.

"Fuck," she whispers, growls at herself.

She turns in the middle of the sidewalk, nearly bumps a businessman off course in her haste to retrace the two miles she's walked in the last two hours, to go back home.

* * *

When she returns to the loft, it's to his daughter sitting alone and sullen at the kitchen bar.

"You were right," Kate sighs, standing in the kitchen with Alexis and a cold sweat that's claimed her skin since she slipped from Castle's grasp in the bathroom, since she strode past his concerned daughter with the promise to return before ten and escaped into the cool night air. She thought he'd still be awake, but apparently, according to Alexis, Rick spent an hour picking at his dinner before proceeding to return to his room for the night not long after she left. "Everything you said earlier. He makes me happy too, Alexis. I just wasn't ready to hear it, to grasp just how much I… want him, too."

His daughter softens from her defensive posture at the explanation, not necessarily looking angry with Beckett, but without a doubt disappointed in her for running scared earlier, for leaving her dad to pout at the dinner table.

Kate's quite disappointed in herself too, but-

"I needed to clear my head, to think, but I – I shouldn't have run away from him like that," she murmurs, scraping a hand through her hair, but Alexis shakes her head.

"I know I've never… I've never had a serious relationship, felt the potential to be in love with any of the guys I've dated," his daughter hedges with a shrug. "But I get that it can be scary. Especially when it matters, right?"

Kate breathes a silent sigh of relief, because yeah, that was exactly it. It matters, _he _matters, so much more than she was ever prepared for, than she's ready for.

"You're a smart kid."

Alexis grins up at her. "I know."

Alexis surprises her with a fierce hug, a murmured goodnight before she leaves her to ascend up the stairs. Once she's alone, able to take a breath after successfully getting past the first hurdle of Alexis, Kate drifts into his bedroom. She knew he was asleep thanks to his daughter's report and she selfishly hoped he would wake before morning, hoped she would be able to talk, to apologize for walking out on him earlier. But she watches him sleep for a long time before giving in, finally crawling into bed beside him.

She stays above the sheet but beneath the comforter, and seals her forehead to his shoulder. She doesn't try to sleep, riddled with guilt and unease, falling in and out of a restless slumber.

* * *

She's never been a heavy sleeper to begin with, can't afford such a luxury with her job, but since she moved in with Castle and started spending some platonic time in his bed, her body is always ready for battle at even the softest of sounds in the night. She's only been in his bed for a handful of hours when Castle wakes in a panic beside her, fighting his way free from the terrifying grips of a nightmare. His grasping hands flail towards her, instantly jerk her from the light sleep she drifted into.

"Kate, no, Kate- " He gasps her name, chokes on it, and she shifts from her side to hover above his thrashing form, desperate to calm him before he can manage to hurt himself.

"Castle, hey," she calls, reaching for his face, combing her fingers through his hair in hopes that the habit that so often has the tension draining from his body will work its magic. "I'm here, Rick. Wake up, I'm right here," she promises him over and over until his eyes flutter open, the horror receding, and he's able to look up, past the visions of his nightmares, to see her clearly.

"Castle?" she murmurs in concern when she notices that he's holding back tears. "Bad dream?"

"Yeah," he croaks, roughly scrubbing a hand over his jaw while he gingerly lifts himself into a sitting position.

When his eyes begin to glaze over once more, pupils black as ink as they consume the mercurial pools of his irises, Kate places a cool hand to his cheek.

"Castle, hey," she coaxes in a whisper, part of her truly afraid of the look on his face, afraid of what it means. "Talk to me."

It shouldn't surprise her that his dreams are vivid. He's a writer and she's aware that it likely comes with the job, but he's so ghastly pale and drenched in sweat, his body trembling with the aftershocks of horror. This isn't just some bad dream conjured up from his overactive imagination; this is trauma.

"It was you," he rasps, not looking at her, but curling an arm that shakes around her waist to bring her in closer. "You were shot and I couldn't - you were dying and there was nothing-" He chokes on the words and turns his head away from her.

Kate's heart contracts painfully in her chest and she gently laces her arms around his neck, dusts her fingers at his throat, over the thudding beat of his pulse.

"It was just a dream," she breathes into his ear. "Just a dream, Castle. I'm right here."

Castle tightens the arm around her waist and tilts his face into the skin of her neck, hiding there when she doesn't shift or urge him to move. She doesn't really want him to, not any time soon. Not after tonight.

"You came back," he murmurs, humming when her fingers skim along the shell of his ear, another terrible habit that she enjoys far too much. "And you're in my bed."

She huffs a pitiful excuse for laugh, but nods her head against his. "Told you I would. Castle, I'm sorry-"

"Shh, not tonight," he whispers, stroking his fingers down her spine. "Talk about it in the morning. If you still want to."

She doesn't want to, hates talking, but for him... "I'll want to."

He sighs, content, and continues the caress of his fingers along the knobs of her vertebrae, his palm a welcome warmth to her skin through the t-shirt she stole from his bureau.

It's almost five in the morning, but they stay like that, her arms around his neck and his face buried in hers for a full seven minutes according to her view of his alarm clock. Kate finds that she doesn't mind it. Maybe she should, maybe it should worry her that she doesn't, but she can't conjure up the will to care. All of her lines and rules and boundaries have been shot to hell since moving in with him.

She devotes her energy to the comb of her fingers through his hair instead, the scratching of her nails across his scalp, soothing his body until the tension begins to drain from his frame and his rigid muscles go loose against hers.

"I'm sorry, Kate," he sighs, withdrawing from her.

She squeezes the arms around his neck, turns her face into his cheek before she can think better of the move, her lips conveniently falling to rest against the corner of his eye.

"Don't be."

A deep exhale shudders its way up his throat, his warm breath fluttering past his lips and onto her skin, forcing her to hold back a shiver.

_So inappropriate, Kate._

She's the one to pull back then, still keeping her arms loosely entwined around him, but needing the distance before she can do something stupid.

"Are you in pain?" she asks, her eyes flickering down to his chest.

"No, but I think I'm going to try and take a shower," Castle mutters, glancing down at his sweat stained t-shirt in disdain.

"Rick-"

"I can do it," he cuts off her protest with a reassuring lift of his hand. "I've showered plenty of times on my own since the shooting."

"And I worry about you falling every time," she mutters, rolling her eyes and disentangling her arms from around him. He catches her hand, though, brings her palm to his cheek and grazes his lips to the inside of her wrist.

Kate holds her breath through the brush of his kiss to her skin, prays he can't hear the uneven cadence of her heart resounding through her chest, feel the flutter of her pulse beneath his lips. And yeah, all of those boundaries that she set coming into this ordeal over a month ago have definitely been crossed. She isn't even sure they exist any longer.

Castle releases her hand and looks back to her with a smile, neither coy nor teasing, but wholly sincere, earnest, and devastating. "Thank you, for being here. Coming back."

"Always," she answers unthinkingly and oh, it's the wrong thing to say. His eyes light up, shining like sapphires in the darkness of his bedroom.

She knows in that moment that's there's no chance of going back to the way they were now. She's in this – whatever this is – and to back out of it now would be to steal the hope and happiness from his eyes and she just couldn't bear that. Couldn't bear to risk it again as she did mere hours ago.

Nor does she want to.

Maybe it isn't wrong at all; maybe it was the perfect word to speak. Maybe she wants to be in whatever this is with him.

"Go back to sleep," he murmurs, releasing her hand with a final stroke of his thumb to the thin skin of her wrist.

Kate sighs, lets him drift towards the bathroom while she slides beneath his sheets.

* * *

He stays in the shower until the water runs cold, until the images of her pale, lifeless, and bleeding out beneath him have slipped down the drain. When he emerges from the bathroom in a fresh pair of boxers and t-shirt, he's relieved to find that Kate's asleep.

Their fight – if it could even be called a fight – in the bathroom earlier, her departure from the loft, rattled him, shook the faith he had in her and the hope for… them, but she proved him wrong. She came back, sought him out in his bedroom, and crawled in next to him when she found him asleep.

They'll still have to talk, despite how little he is looking forward to rehashing the conversation that sent her sprinting, but for now, Kate Beckett is in his bed, curled beneath his sheets with her head on his pillow, and it's enough.

Enough for tonight. More than he could have hoped for.

Rick runs the towel through his hair one last time before carefully climbing back into his bed, laying himself out alongside her. He feels her shift, eyes blinking blearily through the darkness.

"Cassle?" she mumbles, her head lifting and her fingers grazing his chest, the center of his sternum where the gunshot wound remains.

"Shh, back to sleep, Beckett," he hums, settling against his pillow.

He holds his breath when she drapes one of her legs across his thigh, lays an arm along his torso, and her head at his shoulder.

"Smell good," she sighs, the heat of her breath a pleasant burn to his neck.

Castle turns his head to press his lips to her crown, nose buried in her hair. "You too."

Her fingers twitch at his ribcage, spread over his incision scar, but her chest is rising and falling against his side in a steady rhythm, the need for long overdue rest consuming and keeping her under this time.

"Probably too soon to tell you this," he muses in a whisper that is muffled by the silk of her hair, covering the hand splayed protectively over his side with his own. "But I think I love you, Kate. I think I was falling in love with you before this, but now… it's hopeless, isn't it? Getting rid of me?"

"Probably," she slurs and he stiffens so harshly that it causes a sudden pierce of pain to slice through his bullet wound. Kate glides her hand from beneath his to seal her palm to the spot, soothe the throbbing with the balm of her touch.

"Kate," he rasps the strangled syllable of her name, but she hums, shakes her forehead against his shoulder.

"Shh. Think I love you too, Castle. Now go to sleep."

He lies there for a long time, but her words play on an unending loop in his head, the knowledge that she may love him back, that she could love him at all – how can he possibly sleep after that?


	11. Chapter 11

A body drop has her slipping out of his bed the next morning, only a couple of hours after she's finally managed to find a peaceful, dreamless rest against him. After she also managed to thoroughly turn their entire relationship on its head and surely send Castle's spinning.

But work keeps her busy throughout the day, keeps her mind from spiraling into the mess she's made with Castle and worrying over their inevitable conversation about it. She left a note on his nightstand before she tiptoed out of the loft, a brief explanation of her disappearance and a promise that the events of the previous night would not go unspoken, that they would discuss it all over the dinner she would pick up on the way home.

What she doesn't plan for is the boys both driving her crazy, their teasing of her living situation at the loft becoming utterly unruly. She doesn't count on running into her childhood best friend, Maddie, who quickly becomes a suspect until Kate can prove otherwise. She isn't prepared to continue politely declining Detective Demming's subtle advances as he makes two trips up to the homicide floor to use the espresso machine and stop by her desk before he goes.

"Hey Beckett, I was wondering if you were free later," he inquired with that charming, hopeful smile that made her heart flutter, but it wasn't enough to coax the muscle into taking flight.

"I'm sorry, Demming. I have plans for tonight," she responded with an apologetic smile in return, because part of her did feel guilty, turning him away.

He's an attractive man, has a nice personality, someone she could easily see herself with, someone who could probably make her heart pound properly and her skin flush.

If Castle wasn't in the picture.

"Plans, huh?" Esposito chimed in once the elevator doors shut on the robbery detective. "Plans with the writer still in recovery?"

"By the way, how's that coming along, Nurse Beckett?" Ryan piped up.

She would damn them both with extra paperwork when this case wrapped.

By the time they call it for the day and she's finally driving home with dinner, she's ready to pull her hair out. The idea of discussing something so heavy already has her feeling drained, anxious, but when she walks through the door, Castle isn't waiting for her expectantly as she feared.

Kate deposits the Thai food on the kitchen island, goes to hunt for him in the study, his bedroom, eventually locating him in the bathroom, lighting candles around the massive Jacuzzi tub she's envied for months now.

"Castle?"

His head lifts and his eyes practically light up for her, the gleam of cerulean an instant source of comfort, contentment.

"Hey, you're home," he smiles, reaching for the tub's nozzles, turning the water on. "Thought you might want a bath."

"Oh?" she murmurs, a hum of amusement bubbling on her lips as he presents her with a glass of red wine from the countertop. "What prompted this?"

"I may have received a text that you weren't having the best day," he shrugs, dismissing her before she can ask, interrogate, but she can already guess who sent him the heads up. Damn Lanie. "Also, I know you're running on like three hours of sleep, so if you're not going to bed, you definitely need to relax before your brain short circuits."

"Thanks for the confidence," she deadpans, taking a sip of the wine, humming at the bittersweet spread of flavor on her tongue, the rich burn down her throat. He always has the best wine. "I brought dinner."

"I can wait, enjoy your bath," he grins, moving to drift past her, but Kate snags his fingers, bends to place the wine at the edge of the tub.

"You didn't hurt yourself doing all of-"

"No," he groans, petulant and making her grin despite it. She chuckles as she leans in, dusts her lips to his cheek.

"Then I appreciate it," she murmurs, lingering there a moment too long before releasing his hand and beginning to ease the blazer from her shoulders.

Castle clears his throat, straightens up without wincing, and reluctantly begins inching towards the door. "And if you happen to need any sort of help…"

"Bye, Castle," she replies with a pointed look that has him slipping out the door with the smirk still on his lips.

* * *

Rick busies himself in the kitchen while Kate's in the bath, unpacking the food she brought over, texting with Alexis every few minutes, until he hears the faint call of his name.

He pauses for a moment, just to be certain, but he hears it again and tries not to break into a jog that would cause his chest to catch fire. He shuffles from the kitchen, through the living room, and into his study, drifting into his bedroom, but pausing at the closed bathroom door.

"Beckett? You need something?"

"Yeah," he hears her answer, muffled by the door and the water. "Come in."

He takes that as confirmation that she's decent and eases the door open, immediately lifting a hand to his eyes when he sees that she's still in the tub and her clothes are all off and folded atop the edge of the sink.

"Castle," she calls again, her voice amused, but sounding so thoroughly relaxed. "I'm covered in bubbles. You can't see anything."

Rick hesitantly lowers his palm from his eyes, but sure enough, she's up to her chin in the lavender bubble bath he doused the water in, the suds kissing her chin and clinging to her shoulders.

He has to bite his tongue before he calls her adorable.

"I don't know whether to be disappointed or relieved," he says instead, grinning at her from the doorway.

She rolls her eyes, but her cheeks are flushed from the heat of the bath, her eyes flickering with gold like the candles he has scattered throughout the room, and her lips are smiling at him.

"Thank you for this," she murmurs, shifting in the water, one of arms slithering from the hill of white consuming her chest to brush back a stray strand of hair from her forehead. "This case had wiped me out and this… I needed this."

"Happy to help in any way I can from here, Beckett," he answers, inching a step further into the room to lean against the wall. "Want to talk about the case? I know you miss my consistent expertise and unwaveringly helpful theories."

"Sure, Castle," she placates as she reaches out for her wine, the glass still half full. "I wouldn't be opposed to having a fresh mind on this one."

His heart leaps with the taste of normalcy, the opportunity to build theory again in what feels forever, and glances around for somewhere to sit while she goes over the case details, the current suspects. But aside from the toilet that is too far away from her for his liking… he really should have invested in one of those fancy sofas for bathrooms.

Beckett raises her eyes to him at his lack of response and is quick to notice his dilemma, shifting in the tub and casting her gaze towards the towels.

"Here, let me just get out and we can talk about it in the-"

"No, no, stay," he commands, earning an arch of her eyebrow, but he ignores it and shuffles towards the bathtub, folds his legs beneath him to prop against the bathtub on the floor. "There, I'm ready."

"I don't want you to sit on the floor," she sighs, but then she's placing her glass back on the countertop, replacing the attention of her damp fingers with his hair, combing through the strands.

Castle tilts his head back against the smooth rim of the tub, humming with satisfaction at the touch, even as rivulets of water stray from her fingertips to trickle down his neck and wet his shirt collar.

"I like it here," he mumbles, listening to her chuckle softly before she sighs once more and settles in.

She begins to tell him about the victim, a dead chef found in his restaurant kitchen, the appearance and unfortunate connection to Kate's friend, Madison, the conflict of interest. She doesn't tell him about the boys giving her an even harder time than usual lately, like Lanie mentioned earlier, but she does mention Detective Demming oh so kindly offering his extra help and coffee making services, and flicks his ear when he grumbles over it.

"He brought you coffee?" Castle questions, gritting his teeth to lift his arm, catch the lazy drift of her fingers through his hair. He sits up straighter against the tub to drag her hand downwards, tilting his head to feel her fingers at his jaw.

"Not even my point in bringing him up," she mutters, absentmindedly scratching at his jawbone. "But yeah, from the break room."

"I bought that espresso machine for the homicide floor, not the entire precinct," he mutters, holding her hand captive against his cheek, her palm cool from existing outside of the water and calming the heat of indignation just beneath the surface of his skin.

"Just coffee, Rick," she sighs, distracting him for a long moment with the use of his first name, but he grunts his disapproval.

"I'll make you better coffee in the morning." Yeah, he'll show this Demming guy, upstage him with Beckett's favorite beverage.

"_Anyway_," she continues with a roll of her eyes that he can't see, but can practically hear happening from above. "Tom put the word out on Wolf for me and he'll get back to me in the morning."

"Are you going to apologize to Maddie?" he inquires, mourning the loss her hand when she draws it back to heave herself up from her reclined position, her bare shoulders nearly dry from the air and the bubbles now reaching below her collarbones.

"Yeah, I'm going to ask her to come by tomorrow. It wasn't bad, just… I probably came down on her too hard, and she wasn't thinking of me as a cop when she lied to me about Wolf wanting to leave the business."

"You should invite her here for lunch, let her tell me stories from your wild child phase," he muses, smirking when he earns a pinch of her pruned fingers to his nape.

"Like you could even handle hearing about my wild child phase," she mumbles, water splashing against the walls of the bath as she moves.

"I so could," he argues, a little eager now. "Come on, a tidbit at least? Fun fact? Visual aid?"

"Is this your way of asking to see my tattoo?"

He nearly chokes on his own breath, lungs spasming while his heart violently protests the rattling of his ribs.

"See? Too much for you and that healing heart."

"I resent that," he rasps, still wheezing through every breath. "But – you have a tattoo?"

"And a motorcycle."

Oh, and now all he can think about is Kate Beckett straddling a bike in tight, black leather.

"It's official, you are my boyhood dream."

She laughs, a beautiful sound that echoes off the walls of the tub, plays like a melody through his bathroom, mellowing into a low hum of amusement and he tilts his head against the rim, steals a glimpse of her face. Glowing in the candlelight, relaxed from the bath, but still so pale, exhaustion colliding with the shadows from her lashes beneath her eyes that are brighter than usual.

"I should have waited to ask about this until you were out of the bathtub," he sighs, watching her gaze flicker towards him. "You're naked in my tub and telling me dirty stories, a man can only take so much."

"That's your version of dirty?" she asks, rolling her 'r' ever so slightly, and he's not going to make it if she doesn't stop. "Don't pass out, Castle."

"I'm trying."

She grins, rolls her eyes. "I should get out, go over the case file one more time. We can talk about last night while we eat if that's-"

But Castle shakes his head, turning slowly to rise on his knees, gripping the edge of the tub for balance.

"You should eat, head to bed early, Kate. We can always talk after the case is over."

"Castle," she murmurs, ready to protest, but he waves her off.

"Seriously, I can wait. No need to torture you when you're already suffering from exhaustion."

"Hey," she calls before he can stand, her fingers snagging in the neck of his t-shirt, her eyes flickering to his mouth and his unsteady heart accelerates. "I just – we can delay the conversation, but you need to know-"

"Kate, you don't-"

"I want this." Her teeth pin down her bottom lip and her eyes dip to his chin as her cheeks turn a deeper shade of pink that rushes down to color her throat. "You're – you were right, you are more than a partner. And I know that, I've known it for a while now."

Rick forces the air down his throat, nods thoughtlessly. "If you know that," he murmurs, dislodging the hand at his collar to graze his lips to her knuckles before he pushes up to his feet, stares down at the fierce detective looking so vulnerable in his bathtub, a vast contrast from the last time he witnessed such a sight – when her apartment was an inferno and she was bathed in rubble and ash rather than bubbles. "And if this is... you already know I want the same thing and I can wait as long as you need, Beckett."

And he can, he will; he'll take anything she'll give him.

* * *

"Okay, let me get this straight," Maddie begins, folding her hands beneath her chin and staring back at Kate with intrigue shining bright blue in her eyes beneath the soft lighting of Q3. After they closed the case, she showed up at the restaurant's reopening and mingled with Maddie for a while before they ended up at a table in the back, taste testing the bar's newest cocktail recipes and going over the case. And somehow, her relationship with Castle. "So Richard Castle has been following you around for a year for Nikki Heat research - send him my praise regarding that sex scene, by the way-"

"Maddie," she huffs, dipping her head to hide the blush of her cheeks beneath her hair.

"Then you nearly get blown up by a serial killer who stalked you because of said book, Castle gets shot by the guy, and you volunteer to stay at his loft and take care of him?" Maddie recaps. "And _now_, he's almost better, but you're still _living _with him, and he basically said he loves you and you love him back?" Maddie gasps, the same kind of girlish excitement she wore back when they were teenagers. "Becks, I have to meet this guy. Seriously."

"We never exchanged – he was just rambling while we were lying in bed-"

"You're sleeping together?" she hisses, covering her mouth with both hands, but Kate shakes her head.

"Not like that, I just… fall asleep in his room sometimes," she shrugs and Maddie casts her gaze to the ceiling in exasperation, reminding her far too much of Lanie, who would probably be screaming at her by now. But Maddie doesn't know Castle and their partnership like Lanie does, Maddie doesn't have a bet on when they'd sleep together, and as much as she loves her best friend, it's been refreshing to have some girl talk with an old one.

"So what is the problem here?" Maddie questions with a furrowed brow. "Whether you want to admit it or not, you care about this guy, may even love him – or at least you're well on your way there – so why not just… dive in?"

Kate's mouth goes dry, tongue shriveling up, and she reaches for the water on their table, takes a small sip to clear her throat.

"I guess I'm just afraid, of being hurt," she admits, training her eyes on the trails of moisture trickling down her glass. "Ever since my mom died-" Madison reaches across the table, covering one of Kate's hands, offering comfort in the best way she knows how. Kate sighs and shoots her a pursed lipped smile that feels too strained. "It's like I built up this wall and when it comes to relationships, it's just so much easier to play it safe."

"Rick's not safe?" Maddie murmurs.

Kate inhales through her nose, tries to conjure up the words that scare her to death.

"This recent case with Wolf," she starts, continuing as Maddie nods along. "How he was in love with his foster brother's girlfriend, how he was willing to change his entire life just to be with her… it just reminded me that guys like him, they come in, they upset the apple cart, and of course, he makes you feel alive, but you know he's just going to let you down, so why risk it?"

"I get that, understand the virtue in playing it safe," Maddie concedes, but she already knows that isn't all her friend has to say on the matter. "But Becks, life is too short to play it safe. You can't always listen to that brilliant head of yours. Sometimes the heart just wants what the heart wants."

"Yeah, but-"

"You almost burst into flames, he was shot in the chest," Maddie reminds her with not a trace of teasing in her eyes as she narrows them on Kate. "Maybe you and Castle will crash and burn, but what if you don't? What if you miss out on the opportunity for something incredible just because you're too afraid to risk it? We can always heal from broken hearts, you and I both know that, but none of us can get back lost time."

Kate drops her gaze to the table, impressed with Madison's maturity, how much wiser her best friend has become since high school, but that doesn't change how much she kinda hates when Maddie is right.

"So," Maddie picks up, her voice light and cheerful once more. "Go home to the sexy writer, practice making little Castle babies, and then call me so we can gush about it over brunch."

A laugh escapes her lips, the weight on her chest easing with the gratitude that rushes in, because Maddie always knew how to lift the mood. And despite not necessarily wanting to hear it, she's thankful for her friend's advice too, for words she's needed to hear for quite a while now.

She's done wasting time.


	12. Chapter 12

Kate curses at the espresso machine when it hisses at her, slashing a scalding strip of steam across the heel of her palm that has her lifting the skin to her mouth, growling as the burn subsides beneath her tongue.

She's grown to miss having Castle around the precinct for a lot of reasons and this is unquestionably one of them.

"Problem, Detective?"

She spins at the sound of his voice, appearing like a daydream, but the man standing in the break room doorway is all too real, dressed in a button down and jeans, looking polished and put together for the first time in too long.

"Castle," she grins, abandoning the spiteful coffee machine to approach him. "What're you doing here?"

"Alexis brought me," he beams, shuffling further into the room to meet her, his posture tense, telling of how strenuous the ride must have been on his nearly healed upper body.

"Scars pulling?" she murmurs, her hand rising to his side out of habit, splaying at the site of his incision scar once he reaches her.

Castle sighs, but nods his head. "Just a little. Worth it to be out and about today."

"You act like you haven't been out in the last week," she huffs, brushing her thumb along the fabric of his dress shirt, light blue and bringing out his eyes. "We went for a walk three days ago."

"But I haven't been able to come _here_," he states, snagging her fingers when they fall away, cradling them in the embrace of his palm, against his stomach so no one will see. "Where are the boys, by the way? Montgomery caught me on the way in, but Ryan and Espo's desks are deserted."

"Just running down a lead. Where's Alexis?" Kate inquires, craning her neck over his shoulder for a glimpse of red hair.

"Oh, she's across the street getting some breakfast. I'm going to ride with her to school, then take the town car back home," he sighs, but Beckett chews on her bottom lip, knowing that must mean this visit will be over within a few minutes.

"You'll be okay? Getting back up to the loft?" she murmurs, flexing her fingers to slide through the spaces between his.

"Kate," he says, narrowing his gaze on her. She lifts a hand in supplication.

She doesn't hover, doesn't try to smother his independence, but she won't deny that she worries, involuntarily envisions every worst-case scenario possible.

"Fine, just keep your phone out so you can call me if anything goes wrong."

"Or if I get lonely?"

"Castle." But her lips are quirking and she has to duck her head to hide the smile when he chuckles at her for it.

"You look beautiful today," he murmurs, squeezing her hand. "Didn't get to tell you that this morning."

She doesn't startle at the brush of his hand to her temple, guiding a strand of her hair, the loose curls she spent a little extra time on this morning, to sit behind her ear. But she does cut her eyes to him, to his mouth.

The urge to kiss him is ridiculously strong, has been worse than usual since she lounged in his bathtub with him sitting right beside her just two nights ago, chatting with her like a friend, but inadvertently heating her flesh with his presence alone.

And since her talk with Maddie, the cement in her decision.

"Rick-"

"Hey Kate, Esposito said…" Demming pauses in the doorway and Castle lets go of her hand, glancing over his shoulder to the other man.

Dread coils in the pit of her stomach.

"Hey, Demming, this is Rick Castle," she introduces before it can become awkward.

"Ah, nice to finally meet you, Mr. Castle," Tom replies, a polite smile strung across his lips. "Kate's said a lot of good things."

"All lies," Castle chuckles, extending his hand for the man when Demming steps inside. Kate breathes a sigh of relief. Despite Castle's consistently sour attitude at the mention of him and the visible discomfort coiling around his spine now, she genuinely believes the two men would get along. If Demming wasn't interested in her and Castle wasn't aware of it. "But good to meet you as well. Are you… assisting with another case?"

"Yeah, actually," Demming nods, shoving his hands in the pockets of his blazer.

"Because of the robbery component," Beckett fills in, splaying her palm at the base of Castle's spine in an attempt to dissolve the tension she knows must be forming there.

She's only witnessed Castle jealous once where she was concerned, battling it out with Will Sorenson like boys on a playground, but this… this behavior when it comes to Tom Demming is new to her. It isn't like the last time with Will, when he viewed her as a challenge to pursue. No, he's looking at Tom in the same way she looked at Ellie Monroe a few weeks ago the second she spotted the other woman gazing up at Castle with batting eyes.

Possessive, but afraid. Even more afraid to lose her to someone else.

"And I've got something on the stolen books," Demming continues, tilting his head towards the murder board set up in the nearby conference room. "I'll wait for you."

Kate nods as he heads out. "Be right there."

"I should go, you've got a case to solve and Alexis is waiting downstairs," Castle announces when his phone buzzes in his pocket, but Kate steps in closer, touches her mouth to his cheek.

"See you at home," she murmurs, feeling more than hearing his breath catch, her eyes slipping closed for a brief moment at the squeeze of his hand to her hipbone.

"You will. Try not to have too much fun catching killers without me in the meantime," he teases, but it's weak and his smile is forced when he pulls away, begins his slow trek towards the elevators.

Kate starts for the conference room where Demming is already adding to their timeline, tries to return her head to the case, but the frown on his lips, his downcast eyes, sticks with her for the rest of the day.

* * *

He's noticed that she's been dressing up a little more than usual the last couple of days, nothing extravagant, just subtle things - curling her hair, wearing soft colored sweaters, delicate pieces of jewelry. It has his healing heart feeling like all of its progress is being shot to hell.

She's dressing up for another man while he's trapped in the loft for the majority of the day, waiting for her to come back.

He doesn't know Demming aside from the brief meeting yesterday, but he doesn't like the way Kate looks whenever she talks about him, doesn't like the way Demming _looks _at her. He thinks she's well aware of this by now. But despite the way she's brushed off Rick's resentment at every mention of him, he fears it might not be the end of her time with the robbery detective. The guy has ended up assisting them on their last two (now three) cases. How many more will he 'consult' on? How long until he finally steps up, takes the chance Rick never did, and asks Kate for more than a partnership?

Castle sighs and glares up at the ceiling, still unsettled from meeting the man yesterday morning, angry at himself for allowing his jealousy to color his behavior. Kate arrived home around nine last night, later than usual but understandable considering the new case. He pretended to be asleep when she came into his room before heading to her own for bed.

Her fingertips dusted along his cheek, swept over his chest, his heart, and then she exited the room with a sigh, left him alone in the dark like he deserved.

He's well on his way to a full recovery, physical therapy becoming a little less grueling with every session, but he still has at least another month before he'll regain his ability to function completely without issue, to follow her back to the Twelfth.

Where she already has Tom Demming waiting for her.

"Hey, Castle."

But she's entering his room now, catching him off guard with her return home for lunch, filling him in on the developments for the case while she kicks off her shoes near the door like it's the most natural thing. Like nothing's changed for her while his whole world is collapsing in on itself.

"So, we have a witness who says that he heard Lisa Jenkins in a knock-down-drag-out with Wilder, and another one says that he saw Wilder's cousin dumping his books. But what we don't have from either suspect is motive," Kate murmurs, mostly to herself, since he's having a ridiculously hard time focusing. "Demming's betting on Blake, but I-"

"Oh, I'm sure Demming's onto something," he mutters, the robbery detective's name sour as it rolls off his tongue.

Kate's brow hitches at the bite of his voice, the bitterness in his tone, and of course, it doesn't take her long to catch on, it never does. Especially when he makes it so easy for her. She pins him with a glare as she ventures deeper into his room, descends to the small stretch of space on the mattress beside his hip.

"Still jealous, Castle?" she smirks, reaching forward to scratch her fingers through his hair, running her nails over his scalp, a definite way to shut him up. "It's been three weeks. How long are you going to pout over this?"

He sighs and allows the brush of her fingers to soothe him, because no, he isn't jealous, not when she touches him like this.

"I'm not upset that this case sounds like it's close to being over, if that's what you mean."

She chuckles and he can just feel the subject already slipping away, knows that she's going to switch and ask him how he's feeling or about physical therapy or Alexis or something less personal, and he just isn't ready to let it go. Not until he knows.

"Did he - are you going to see him again after this? Outside of the precinct?"

Her hand stills in his hair, her eyes flashing upwards to snag on his. He knows he may have potentially screwed up, big time, but he doesn't take it back. He can't. He said he loved her, she heard, and she practically said it back - there's no more room for wondering, he wants answers.

Kate withdraws her fingers, lets them trail down to his neck, and bites down on her bottom lip. Uncertain.

"Castle."

He already knows the answer then.

He could disregard the sleepy 'I love you's, but he told her he wanted her and it felt like… he really thought the attraction, the interest in more, was mutual. But Detective Demming asked her out - of course he did, Castle can't blame him - and she said yes, because Tom Demming is a smart, charming, and handsome fellow detective. Just her type.

He's such an idiot for ever thinking she would stick around and pursue something more with him.

Kate's been living with him for over two months, taking care of him out of some self-righteous obligation, and he let himself feel things he's been trying to repress for a while now, long before his shooting. And now he's made the mistake of allowing himself to believe she might reciprocate some of those feelings, but he was wrong, so wrong, and it stings.

Castle looks away, already feeling the crestfallen expression claiming his face and unable to do anything to stop it. He wants her to go, _needs_ her to leave him alone for a while so he can at least compose himself.

"Rick-"

"No, no, I'm sorry I asked," he murmurs, staring hard at the window across the room but not seeing.

"Castle, look at me," she calls softly, touching his chin with her free hand and giving him no choice.

She's much closer than he expected when he follows her command and lifts his gaze, her face only inches from his. Both of her hands ascend to his jaw, cupping his cheeks in her warm palms and smoothing her thumbs over the papery thin skin beneath his eyes.

"Do you really have so little faith in me?" she inquires, her lips falling into a frown at his lack of response, the confidence in her eyes wavering as they flicker down. But she purses her lips, the resolve burning gold in her gaze when she meets his again. "These past two months since you... I thought we had been working towards something, even if it took me a while to realize it."

"I – yes?" he gets out, catching her wrists just to keep her there, clinging to every word of this unexpected conversation.

"And I know we haven't discussed it, I'm sorry for that, but that doesn't mean I'm going to turn my back on you the second another man shows interest in me."

He swallows, suddenly feeling like a total ass for doing exactly as she accused him of – thinking so little of her, doubting her. Maybe she isn't the only one good at running at the first sign of potential heartache.

"I just know I'm not… you've never taken me seriously, Kate," he tries to explain, his heart picking up in his chest, escalating until he can barely hear past the drumming beat, the rush of blood in his ears that is certainly flooding the cheeks beneath her palms as well. "I can't necessarily blame you for that, but being cooped up here while some other guy – a great guy, from the sounds of it – gets to do what I _wish _I was doing, working with you and bringing you coffee… it upsets me. And I'm not oblivious to how petty I sound, but you're my partner, my muse, and _I _love you. I don't want to lose you."

Somewhere throughout that last confession, he lost his nerve, used up the last of his courage, and allowed his eyes to drop to her shoulder, not prepared to witness the panic that will flood her irises and snuff out all the light he saw there.

He just told her he loved her, again. Not at night, under the veil of nightmares and darkness, both of them lying half asleep in his bed, but in the light of day where it can't so easily be dismissed or overlooked.

"Were you not listening when I told you what I wanted the other night?"

Castle's eyes snap back to her, Kate's alight with something he can't read, like she has a secret he doesn't know about and can't decode. But before he can even try, offer her any kind of answer, she's leaning forward and kissing him soundly on the mouth.


	13. Chapter 13

For a moment, it is only the pleasant pressure of Kate's lips on his, but Castle's hand eventually rises to the back of her neck, clutching her carefully and kissing her back. Her mouth curves against his, a smile forming even as she manages to nip at his upper lip, and gradually disappearing as she traces the seam of his mouth with her tongue.

She's pulling away all too soon, though, and Rick finds himself using all of the strength in his abdomen to lean forward, to chase her. Kate gentles him, cradles his jaw, and tilts her forehead into his instead.

"He did ask me out," she confirms, a breathless quality to her tone that satisfies him beyond comprehension, feeds the flame of need spreading through his chest like gasoline to the fire. "But I told him I was already involved with someone else."

"Me?" he breathes out on an exhale. And yes, he knows he sounds like some wonderstruck idiot, can hear it in his own voice, but he doesn't care, because if it's true, if it's _him _that Kate is talking about-

She laughs and kisses him again, a chaste brush of her lips over his. Rick lifts both of his hands to tangle through the soft waves of her hair, draw her in close until she has to place one of her knees on the edge of the bed, a hand against the headboard.

"Yeah, Castle. You."

"This is real? I'm not in a medically induced type of dream right now? Because if so-"

"Stop talking," she groans, relying on the weight of her hands as she tilts forward to kiss him again, her open mouth covering his, sealing off his doubts with the fit of her lips, siphoning his worries with the stroke of her tongue.

She gasps into his mouth when he glides his hands down her sides, slips his fingers beneath the hem of that pretty pink sweater and splays his palms over the naked skin of her back, the smooth expanse of flesh at the base of her spine.

"Don't stop," he mumbles, pleads, cradling her body against his as one of her legs slides over his thighs, straddling his waist, and oh, this is so much better than any dream his mind could conjure up. "Not yet."

"No," she breathes, nipping at his bottom lip. She sinks into his lap, releasing a quiet moan that immediately becomes his new favorite sound.

Her fingertips trail strips of heat along his skin, skimming along his jaw, down his throat, penetrating the fabric of his t-shirt. He attempts to rise into the grazes of her touch, but Kate shakes her head.

"Careful," she mumbles, but he sucks her bottom lip into his mouth, has her hands clutching at his shoulders, desperate to erase his injury from her mind for just a few moments; he doesn't want her to think about anything but this.

Her hips drag over his, slow and deliberate, and Castle gasps, digging his fingers into her skin before he decides to put his strengthened muscles to the test. Kate arches into the cove of his body when he surprises them both, rolls them over rather smoothly until she's on her back, panting into his mouth, ensnaring her fingers in his hair.

"I want you," she breathes, their legs tangling as he eases down on top of her, unable to support his upper body and hover over her for too long, but she embraces the downfall of his frame, the fit of their bones and weight of heat. "Fuck, I want you, Castle."

He growls to silence the guttural moan caught in his throat, nips at her jaw and descends his mouth to her neck, laves his tongue over the drumbeat of her pulse, closes his mouth over the spot and suckles until she mewls.

"You have no idea," he husks, lips brushing hers when she tugs on his hair, urges him back to her mouth. "How badly I want you back."

Her lips spread into a grin beneath his, her hips undulating and causing them both to hiss. "I think I do. But – oh, I have to go back to work."

"I don't want you to go back to work," he mumbles, slicking his tongue along the seam of her lips. Kate hums beneath him, her body buzzing with pleasure.

One of her legs twines around his, her breasts pressing hard against his chest as she rotates them again, returning him to his back while she remains tangled above him. Castle brackets her waist in his hands, glides his fingers back beneath her sweater to continue mapping the skin of her back, the valleys of flesh and ridges of bone, the mountain of her spine.

The weight of her body is probably applying a tad too much pressure on his chest, but he doesn't want her to move, doesn't want her to stop kissing his mouth and torturing him with the tremble of her hips trying not to roll against his.

"Castle," she breathes out, panting harshly against the corner of his mouth before she buries her face in his neck, tries to steady the riot of her heart that he can feel through her chest against his. "Are you even… cleared for this kind of activity?"

He swallows hard, rubs at her back as the heat of her breath stains his throat, trying to calm them both.

"Yeah, I was cleared a couple of weeks ago," he murmurs, stroking his knuckles along the cage of her ribs, toying with the hem of her sweater.

"I don't want it to be rushed," she confesses, her forehead lifting to rest against his.

Castle sighs but nods his agreement. He's been waiting for this kind of chance with her for over a year now; he's damn well going to do it right.

"How much time until you have to go back?" he asks, closing his eyes as his heartbeat finally begins to slow.

Her hand rises from beside his neck, her father's watch lifting into his line of sight. "About fifteen minutes."

"Have you eaten? I could make you something," he offers, but Kate shakes her head, shifts until she's lying against his side, pressed in tight and close.

"I'll grab something on the way back, eat in the car."

"Kate," he murmurs in disapproval, but she stretches forward to nip at his jaw, his new favorite way for her to quiet him.

"I have other things I'd rather dedicate the remainder of my lunch hour to," she mumbles, smirking when he glances down at her with an arched brow and his heart skipping with anticipation, with an overwhelming flood of joy.

Mere minutes ago, he was prepared to accept defeat and succumb to self-pity, and now Kate Beckett is lying in his bed, making out with him in the middle of the day.

He never would have imagined being shot in the chest would result in this chain of events, in the eventual bloom of their relationship; he never thought he would be grateful to the bullet for piercing his sternum and sending them down this path.

"Wait, I have a question."

"Oh no," Kate mutters, but he shakes his head, tangles his fingers in the loose curls of her hair.

"Well, more like a suggestion, really-"

"Get to it, Castle," she hums impatiently, nudging her nose to his cheekbone, and wow, he never would have fathomed Kate Beckett rushing to get back to _kissing_ _him_.

Dreams really do come true.

"Let me take you out on a date," he murmurs, waiting for the rise of her eyes, the spark of intrigue illuminating the swirling browns and greens of her irises. "I know I'm not totally healed, but I'm well enough to dress up, take you to dinner."

Beckett bites her bottom lip, the pearls of her teeth touching his cheek before she ascends onto her elbows, stares down at him with a smile blooming beneath those teeth. "Okay."

* * *

Kate zips the back of the dress she went shopping for with Lanie earlier that week, pressing her palm to her stomach to calm the butterflies dancing inside, feeling even more ridiculous for it. He's right downstairs in his own bedroom, with Alexis helping him pick out a tie, and they're going to dinner, that's all.

Except he loves her and they kiss now and they're going on their first real _date_.

"Dad is going to flip." Beckett startles, huffs at herself for it when she catches Alexis in the mirror, peeking in through the doorway with an impish grin. "You look gorgeous."

"Thank you, Alexis," she chuckles, turning away from the mirror and resisting the urge to run her hand through her hair, the curls she spent too much time perfecting. "Speaking of, is your dad ready?"

"He should be, he was just primping in the bathroom when I left," Alexis smirks, opening the door wider as Kate approaches. "So did he tell you where you're going?"

Beckett scoffs, snags her clutch from atop the dresser near the door, and shakes her head. "No, he wants it to be a surprise."

"Typical Dad," Alexis grins, waiting for Kate to join her in the hall, starting with her towards the stairs. "But I'm sure it'll be worth the wait. All of his surprises usually are."

Kate hums, a matching grin tugging at the corner of her mouth, but there's a surprise of a different kind already waiting downstairs as they approach the first floor of the loft - hushed voices in the doorway, Castle arguing with someone.

"No, no, I said I _wasn't _going," she can hear Castle hissing. "Gina, I have plans. _Important _plans. You can't just show up and demand I-"

"Oh, is that your _plan_, Richard?" Gina sneers in response. Castle's eyes follow the jerk of her head towards the stairs, his lips parting and the irritation fading from his gaze as it lands on her.

"Wow," he breathes, skating his eyes down the length of her frame, the deep green cocktail dress that clings to her curves and comes to a stop just above her knees, the elegant v-neck that allows a glimpse at her chest and the heels that lengthen her legs. She does her best not to blush, especially not when his second ex-wife is glaring daggers in her direction. "Yes. My plan."

"Richard, this is your _career_," Gina presses, lowering her voice. Beckett's brow furrows as she and Alexis descend the last few steps. "Reschedule date night with your precious detective for some other night."

"Gina," he growls, but Beckett drifts towards them, swallowing down her apprehension at the presence of his publisher, because that's all she is now. His publisher, who just mentioned work, which is the only reason why she's here. Even if she is draped in a gleaming white gown with her hair in perfect golden ringlets.

"Something wrong?"

"No," Castle assures her quickly, but Gina blows out a breath through her flared nostrils.

"Yes," Gina contradicts with only a brief glance her way. "Richard was supposed to attend a gala with me tonight. It's been planned for months now and he's expected to show."

"That was scheduled before I got shot, Paula was supposed to cancel-"

"Oh yes, because you're obviously so incapable of going out," she mutters. Beckett catches Castle's hand fisting at his side, his jaw squaring, and reaches for his arm.

"Castle, I think you should go," Kate murmurs, earning the sharp turn of his head, the immediate protest rising in his eyes, on his mouth. She uses her grip on his elbow to tug him towards her.

"Give us a second," he tells Gina, placing a hand to the small of Kate's back, nodding towards his office. She sighs, but lets him herd her through the entry of bookshelves for a moment of relative privacy.

"Castle-"

"I'm not going," he whispers, draping his hands at her waist when she turns to face him. "God, Kate, you look breathtaking. I'm not giving this up for a stupid press gala."

She gnaws on her bottom lip, watches his eyes flick to her pin of teeth; she really doesn't want him to go either, wants him to turn away his ex-wife and take her to this surprise location he spoke of for dinner, have an enchanting night that she admittedly hoped might end back here, in his bedroom.

But she also cares about his career, his writing, and despite her less than pleasant personality at times, her former relationship to Castle, Beckett knows that Gina wouldn't be pushing this hard if this event wasn't important.

"You can take me out next week," she sighs, brushing her palms over his chest, curling her fingers in the lapels of his suit jacket. It's the first time she's seen him dressed up in months and he looks beautiful, delicious in a crisp pair of fitted slacks, a white dress shirt that causes his eyes to swirl like the sea. She already regrets telling him to go, even if it is the right thing to do. "It's been a while since you were in the public eye and if it's good for your image, your writing-"

"Kate," he whines, dragging her in closer by the hips, dropping his forehead to rest against hers, and pressing in close enough to nudge her nose with his, paint her lips with his breath. "You have no idea how long I've waited for this."

She tilts her chin, angling her head so that all she has to do is lean in to claim his mouth, undoing him slowly with the work of her lips, the languid stroke of her tongue, slipping inside the warm cove of his mouth, and gasping when he backs her into the desk.

"I don't?" she hums, nipping at the corner of his mouth, gliding her hands up his chest to curl her fingers at his nape, comb through the fine hairs at the base of his skull. "It's been worth the wait so far, Castle. Besides, you've already got me. No date necessary."

"Not the point," he grumbles, diverting from her mouth to skim his lips along her jaw. "You took the time to get ready-"

"I can do it again in a week," she shrugs, her heartbeat stuttering as he opens his mouth at her neck, a pathetically breathy noise just shy of a moan leaving her lips. "Rick."

He sighs and lifts his head, looks so very mournful. "I'm sorry."

"Nothing to be sorry for," she murmurs, her hands slipping to straighten his jacket. "I'll just hang with Alexis, be here when you get back."

"Which will be as soon as possible," he mumbles, capturing her mouth once more, pulling a soft moan from her throat and a shallow thrust of her hips. "And I'll be thinking about that the entire time."

She watches him leave with Gina a few minutes later, the frown carved deep into his lips as he grudgingly allows his second ex-wif- _publisher, _she corrects, take his arm. She ignores the rush of jealousy that bristles through her, redirecting her attention to Alexis instead, standing in the kitchen with a downturned twist to her lips that matches her father's.

"You guys are being far too melodramatic about all of this," Kate chuckles from the foyer, glancing towards the stairs and withholding a sigh. Might as well get undressed, wash her face clean of the makeup. "I'm going to change and then we can-"

"Wait," Alexis murmurs, straightening at the island. Kate arches an eyebrow at the eager flare of bright blue spreading through Alexis's eyes. "What if you could still have your date with Dad?"

"He just… Alexis, he has the gala," she says slowly, as if his daughter has not just witnessed Castle walk out the door with Gina, but Alexis shakes her head as she comes towards her.

"Yeah, I know, but what if you just went to the gala too?"

"I - I don't have an invitation or a gown," Kate murmurs, pushing down the tentative rise of excitement that blooms through her chest at the idea. "Besides, your dad probably would have just asked me to come with him otherwise."

"He probably couldn't think about it with Gina breathing down his neck in the doorway," Alexis mumbles and Beckett smothers her amusement behind pursed lips. She has grown so accustomed to the exceedingly polite teenager over the last year, but since moving into the loft, spending so much time with the Castles, she's learned that his daughter has a refreshingly sarcastic side, a wry sense of humor that Kate can relate to. "And Gina always claims his plus one invites because Paula always gives them to her unless Dad says otherwise beforehand, but I know how to get you an invitation _and_ a gown."

Kate hesitates, stares back at the girl waiting on her with bated breath and hopeful eyes, and just has to ask.

"Alexis, why is this so important to you?"

Alexis stills at the question, her cheeks flushing a gentle shade of pink, but she inhales a steady breath and meets Beckett's eyes.

"I've seen my dad in a lot of relationships, but I don't think I've ever seen him in love," Alexis admits, tucking a long strand of hair behind her ear. "And I mean, before you guys were even together, before he got shot, he literally lit up talking about you, and now… I don't know, maybe it's stupid, but - but since his shooting, it just feels like every day matters even more than it did before. He could have died that day, he could die tomorrow, so could you or me and I just-" Alexis pauses to sigh, tangle up her hands in front of her. "I don't want to live my life afraid to take risks anymore. And I don't want the people I love to either."

Alexis lifts nervous eyes back to her, cheeks a darker shade of pink now. Kate swallows hard, a little skeptical, mostly shell-shocked from that unexpected speech, her heart pitter-pattering at the strange sense of urgency his daughter's words have evoked. It may just be a date, not necessarily a life changing scenario, but she can agree with one thing.

She doesn't want to waste any more time.

"Well," Kate murmurs, clearing her throat. "I certainly can't say no after that."

Alexis grins, her chest deflating with relief, and moves past her for the door, snagging her purse from the coat closet and already dialing a number on her phone.

"Come on, before Dad decides to try and sneak out," Alexis tosses over her shoulder.

Kate smirks, grabs her clutch from the coffee table to follow his daughter out the front door.


	14. Chapter 14

They take a cab to the boutique Alexis tells her about, arriving fifteen minutes before the shop is set to close. They receive a warm welcome from the owner, who apparently knows Alexis well, despite the hour, greeting her with twin kisses to her cheeks and a rich French accent.

"I received your photo of the detective and have already selected a few garments that I think will compliment her beautifully," the older woman, Anne - she thinks she heard Alexis say - announces, guiding them towards the back of the otherwise empty store. A clothing rack with three gowns, all of which look stunning and expensive, hang in waiting.

"I have a ton of store credit," Alexis assures her when Kate stalls in front of the rack. "This is where Dad's always taken me to get prom dresses."

"Yes, Mr. Castle is a very loyal customer," Anne chimes in, adjusting the eyeglasses she pushes back from her face to rest amidst the silver strands of her hair. "He shops for his mother and daughter multiple times a year. Keeps me in business," the woman adds with a wink, gesturing towards the gowns. "Alexis says you are having an emergency, late for a gala?"

Kate nods and musters a smile, drifts closer to the dresses, running her fingers over the shimmering fabrics.

"How did you already know my size?" she inquires, her hand lingering on a gown drenched in gold.

"I sent it to her on the way over," Alexis chirps, stepping up beside her and whispering her own fingers over a silky piece of midnight blue. "I remembered it from when you let me try on one of your pantsuits for that job interview I had a few weeks ago. Plus, Anne is just that good."

Anne shrugs and Kate huffs, gingerly plucking the gold dress from the rack. The midnight blue, even the striking red piece, are both closer to her comfort zone, but there's something about the gold one-shoulder that draws her in.

"I was hoping she'd pick that one," she hears Anne gush to Alexis while she enters the dressing room.

When she slips into the gown behind the curtain, feels the fit and witnesses the looks of the other two women's faces as she emerges, she knows she's chosen well.

"You are exquisite, darling," Anne praises, approaching from behind her in the full length mirror. "Like a goddess. All you need now are the shoes, a simple bracelet-"

"Oh, no, I couldn't-"

"Hush," the woman chastises from behind her, shooting Beckett a grin in the mirror. "You are the perfect advertisement for my brand. You repay me by telling everyone where you got this gown, okay?"

Kate sighs, but nods, brushes back the curls of her hair, the streaks of honey highlighted by the glimmering gold of the dress. "Okay."

Anne disappears from her side towards a wall filled with varying styles of exquisite heels, directing Alexis towards the carousel of jewelry near the counter just as the door swings open.

"Oh, well, this is just the epitome of a fairy godmother moment."

Kate glances up at the sound of Martha's voice ringing through the shop, Alexis abandoning her mission to embrace her grandmother in a hug. Their words are too quiet for Kate to hear, but whatever Alexis says sends Martha sauntering her way.

"Oh, Kate, darling, you look divine," Martha praises, drawing her into a brief hug and fluttering her ring embellished fingers along Kate's bare shoulders, sweeping her gaze over her from head to toe. "My invitation to this silly gala is certainly going to good use now."

"Your invitation?" Beckett echoes, flicking her eyes to Alexis, approaching with Anne and a pair of strappy gold stilettos.

"I get invited to these things all the time, some for my legacy as an actress, others solely for the sake of being Richard's mother. I usually prefer to only attend the prior, unless the latter holds an interest for me as well," Martha explains with a wink while Anne bends to drop the shoes at Kate's feet. "But I had forgotten all about this one until Alexis contacted me, told me she was in dire need of my invite. I have to say, I'm so thrilled you're doing this, Katherine."

"You are?" Kate inquires, allowing Anne to take her arm, slip the gleaming gold cuff onto her wrist.

"Of course!" Martha exclaims, taking a step back to greet Anne with a wide smile, sharing cheek kisses and excited words in French.

Alexis grins, holds out a hand for Kate to balance while she steps into the heels.

"The gala is just a couple of miles from here, are you ready?" his daughter asks with a glance at the screen of her phone while Kate spares one last look at herself in the mirror. The cascade of gold over her frame, the stilettos twined around her feet, the hint of a smile tugging at her lips at the thought of seeing him, surprising him… she doesn't think she's ever felt this beautiful.

"Yeah, I'm ready."

"Splendid!" Martha declares, producing the simple ivory envelope from her purse with a flourish and handing it over to Kate. "You can take the cab I have waiting outside. The fare's already paid."

"Oh, no, Martha, you don't have to-"

"Ah, ah, your chariot awaits, kiddo," Martha insists with an indulgent grin. "Now, go be the belle of the ball."

"And don't worry about your other dress and shoes, we'll take them back home for you," Alexis assures her, grabbing her clutch from the dressing rooms' waiting area while Kate does her best not to linger on how easy it is to think of the loft as _home_.

"Thank you, Anne," Kate murmurs, squeezing the other woman's hand in gratitude when she reaches up to pat Kate's cheek. "_Tu m'as fait tres belle_."

"Nonsense. I did nothing, you are already a work of art, Kate," Anne returns with a pleased curl of her lips before nudging her towards the door.

Alexis follows closely, excited energy bubbling from the teenager's frame.

"Have fun," Alexis adds once they're stepping through the exit, onto the sidewalk and towards the idling cab. Kate turns before she can approach the car, pausing to hook an arm around Alexis's neck.

"Thank you," she murmurs after a tight squeeze, pulling back to smile down at the girl who's gone out of her way for no other reason than to see people she cares about happy, to make tonight magical. "Martha is great, but if I ever need any fairy godmother services again, I'm calling you."

Kate lets her go to open the door, realizing the driver already has the address, but she waits until Alexis is slipping back into the boutique, waving from safely inside, before she tells the cabbie to go.

* * *

Castle is bored.

Hiding from Gina in various places across the venue under the guise of speaking with various people has been fun, but it's been over an hour and his 'date' has become unavoidable. It's how he ends up with her in the middle of the ballroom floor, swaying to the classical music provided by the orchestral band on the stage.

"You haven't written at _all_?" Gina presses, for the millionth goddamn time.

Rick purses his lips into a thin line, attempts to breathe past the irritating itch of his gunshot wound, his surgical scar.

"I've been kinda busy, Gina," he mutters, diverting his eyes to the grand clock positioned high above the stage. If he can just last another hour, just one more hour, he'll be able to leave at a respectable time. And still have enough time to salvage at least a fraction of a night with Kate. "I was only shot in the chest a couple of months ago-"

"Oh, don't give me that," Gina huffs. He returns his gaze to her incredulously. "I'm sure your hands were working well enough to type within a couple of weeks. You've just been too busy with that detective."

"Kate," he corrects, his voice hedging towards a growl. "Her name is Kate."

"Yeah? Well, _Kate_ has become a lot more of a distraction than a muse," she snaps, her voice dripping with bitterness, but her brown eyes are alight with more than their usual flames of indignation. It's times like these when he wonders how he married this woman, how they survived as husband and wife for as long as they did.

"Do you even hear yourself? There wouldn't be any books without her," he snaps back, hissing when she pinches his shoulder for earning the curious attention of another couple swaying on the dance floor.

"You know that's not what I'm talking about. You're too busy playing house when you should be working on the second book," she accuses, setting his own irritation aflame. Castle release her hand, dropping his loose hold on her waist. That's enough. He's _had it_. "Richard-"

He pivots on his heel, ignores the sharp tug in his chest at the action, and leaves her on the dance floor. He's doing her a favor really, because Gina doesn't like to make a scene - not a negative one at least - and if he has to spend another second on the ballroom floor with her, he will definitely be making one she won't approve of.

"Richard Castle," Gina scolds, the skirt of her dress clutched in her fist and her heels clicking sharply as she attempts to discreetly storm after him.

"What exactly was your plan here, Gina?" he demands under his breath once she's caught up to him at the buffet table, fuming. "Drag me out to this thing so you could force me into listening to your lectures? It's not going to make me write any faster, or at all. When are you going to figure that out?"

"Maybe I was trying to drag you back into reality," Gina hisses, crossing her arms over her chest. "You were shot, Richard, it's horrible, and I get it. You needed time to recover, but it's obvious from your previous plans for the night that you're well enough to get back to your _real_ life and the responsibilities that come with it."

"Funny how you keep bringing up my _previous plans_," he scowls, but Gina only rolls her eyes.

"Look, I don't care who you sleep with anymore, all I care about is getting those chapters in a timely-"

"Who I sleep with? What - you think that's what I'm-"

"I frankly don't care," Gina reiterates on a sigh.

"Well, I do," Castle growls, his hand curling into a fist at his side. "Kate and I haven't been sleeping together, Gina. She's been helping take care of me since the day I was released from the hospital because she cares about me, because she - she loves me back."

Gina scoffs, but after being married to her, despite how short of a time it lasted, he still knows her quirks, recognizes the uncomfortable shift in her body language despite the scowl on her face.

"I hate to burst your bubble here, Richard, but do you really think she'll be sticking around for much longer now that you're healed?"

"You just said that you don't care, but it sure feels like you do," Castle mutters, narrowing his gaze on her. But when she fails to answer, he only shakes his head. "You know what? It doesn't matter what you think, she's what I want."

Gina smirks, a veneer. "Yeah, but for how long?" she challenges, casting her gaze over the clusters of city officials, celebrities, the rich, the famous, some both. "Did you forget that you and Detective Beckett are from two completely different worlds? Can you ever actually see her fitting in here?"

"I don't know." Castle startles with a spark of hope and spins at the sound of her voice. His chest hitches, scar throbbing, at the sight of her for the second time tonight. Kate lifts a brow at his ex wife. "I think I'm doing pretty well so far."

"Kate," he exhales, the words leaving with all of the air from his lungs.

He's not a stranger to beautiful women, but he came to the conclusion quite a while ago that none would ever compare to Kate Beckett. He's reminded of that fact with certainty now as she stands before him in a shimmering gold gown, one of her shoulders completely bare, the ridge of her collarbone sharp and on exquisite display. The caramel curls of her hair just barely skim the sculpted bones and exposed skin, a reverent brush of a touch that he yearns to mimic.

He's speechless, breathless, and the dazzling curve of her smile that he usually only sees in the privacy of his loft leaves him without hope of finding either any time soon.

"Hey, Castle."

"Hi," he murmurs, automatically stepping towards her, forgetting all about Gina, about the ballroom around them, the eyes on them. It's terribly sappy, he knows, but he forgets about everything other than Kate.

"Think I fit in okay?" she muses with another arch of her eyebrow.

He huffs, incredulous, before he remembers Gina's statement, how wrong she is.

"You fit," he confirms, skimming a hand along her side, caressing the glimmering fabric that drapes along her body like a second skin. He's grateful when she drifts into him, a smile curling at the edge of his lips at the move, because he remembers how Beckett likes to claim. And that was before they were even together. "But you also outshine everyone in the room."

Her eyes flicker up to him at that, liquid gold like her dress, lowering to his mouth, wanting to kiss him. Oh, he needs to get rid of Gina.

Castle squeezes Kate's hip, tearing his eyes away from her to look back to Gina in question.

"You were saying?"

Gina clears her throat, visibly embarrassed, but composes herself well, shifting her gaze to Kate.

"Detective Beckett, I meant no offense, I was simply trying to explain to Richard that-"

"I'm aware of what you were trying to do, Ms. Cowell," Kate addresses her with that same professional tone he's so used to hearing at the precinct. Somehow, it's even hotter now, with her here, in this stunning dress and at his side. "But I assure you, I will do my best not to be detrimental in any way to Rick's career."

Gina purses her lips, looking reluctant to go.

"Well then, as long as you're both here, may as well make the most of it," Gina nods, averting her eyes to the crowd. "Be sure to smile pretty for the cameras."

He watches the line of Kate's throat bob, but the smooth curve of her lips doesn't waver.

"We'll do our best."

Gina doesn't spare them another glance, pushing her shoulders back and lifting her chin before striding back into the throngs of glamorous people.

"You don't even see it, do you?" Kate murmurs, earning the returning swivel of his gaze.

"All I see is you," he grins, trailing his knuckles along the dip of her spine.

Her teeth claim her bottom lip, trapping it momentarily beneath the pin of them, but her eyes are glittering like her dress. "Gina was hoping you'd see her."

He blinks, tilting his head at the response. "See her? You mean..." Oh, wait, she - _oh_. Like that. "Kate, we're divorced."

"Didn't stop her from looking at you like she wanted another chance, Richard," she purrs, her hand rising between them to splay over his incision scar. Her fingers rub along the stretch of it, soothing the itch, the ache. "Can't blame her."

"Too late," he mumbles, taking just a moment to check, to roam his eyes around the room and clock the lingering gazes on him, before touching a fleeting kiss to her hairline. "I've got what I want."

Her opposite hand rises to finger the collar of his shirt, slipping to hold to the lapel of his suit. "You'll have to walk me through this whole... publicity thing."

"All you have to do tonight is dance with me, Detective. No interviews or reporters this time around," he assures her, following the delicate line of her spine with his knuckles until he feels warm skin beneath his. "Gina was just trying to freak you out."

Kate hums, sinks a little further into him at the slow rhythm of his hand at her back. "I was aware."

"And... did she?" he hedges, waiting for her eyes to meet his, for one of her eyebrows to arch.

She nudges him with her hip, the warm length of her body flirting with his as they drift towards the sea of swaying couples amidst the ballroom floor.

"Are we going to dance or not, Castle?"


	15. Chapter 15

She hates the attention. The stares, the intrigue, the judgement. All of it comes so naturally here, in his world. The flash of cameras greet them like lightning when they step outside, her head down and her hand enveloped in his on the brisk walk to the limo.

"Still okay?" he asks her once they're both enclosed within the car.

The limousine pulls out into the streets, the flash of the cameras dying outside the tinted windows and turning into nothing but fading light as the city's glow engulfs them instead.

"I had a good time," she tells him truthfully, reaching across the thin strip of space between them to claim his anxious knee. Her lips quirk. "What is this, first date jitters?"

He huffs, shifts in his seat, heightening the amusement humming in her throat. "No. Besides, this would hardly qualify as our first date."

"No?"

He cuts his eyes to her, both narrowing and questioning at once. "Kate, you sleep in my bed the majority of nights. We're past first date jitters."

She's grateful for the darkness inside the car, the lack of light that prevents him from seeing the subtle flush kissing her cheeks.

"You've got a point," she murmurs, snagging her bottom lip with her teeth. "You still look nervous."

He sighs at her, exasperated, but she only smirks in response.

"We just had our first public appearance, something that neither of us had planned for, and I know we've been living together for a while, but we just started actually-" His hand flutters in the air between them and she has to purse her lips to refrain from grinning at his conflict. "Being together. So I don't want to do anything too fast because I'm trying not to screw this up-"

"Rick," she says softly, squeezing the bone of his knee beneath her palm. But it's as if he hardly heard her.

"And you - you look like that," he whines, waving his fluttering hand over her. "The most gorgeous thing I've ever seen and all I really wanted to do tonight was take you out for an intimate dinner, have you all to myself."

"The latter can still be arranged," she interrupts, finally snapping his full attention back to her.

His words, rushed and troubled, have the yearning that's been swimming through her blood all evening simmering to the surface. Her eyes flicker towards the partition, up and shielding them from the driver, before returning to him. Even in the darkness, she knows he catches the fall of her gaze to his mouth, the purposeful caress of it along his face.

The line of his throat, his adam's apple, ripples.

"Kate."

Her name is a raw, scraped and abraded sound on his lips.

She rises from her seat, uncrossing her legs to ease them into a straddle over his. He stares up at her throughout the transition, the shimmering gold from her dress reflecting across his jawline as she moves. She dips to touch her mouth to the edge of bone, following along the length of stubbled skin until she can linger at the corner of his mouth.

His hands hover at her sides, as if unsure where to land. The skim of his fingertips along her ribcage has her nuzzling forward to suppress a moan of impatience, burying it in the seal of her lips over his.

Castle doesn't try to hide his moan, letting it slip into her mouth, feed the fire between her legs.

"God, I love being able to do this with you," he breathes, finally pressing his palms to her spine, pulling her closer.

Her hips fall, settling over his as if they were meant to fit there.

Her fingers curls in the collar of his dress shirt. She can feel everything through the thin layer of his slacks, can feel how much he wants her, and - oh, she doesn't want the first time to be in the back of a car, even if it is a limo, but she's tempted. So tempted to just have him already.

The drape of his hands at her back gentles, soothing rather than seductive, as if he's reading her mind, her reluctance to go any further.

Yet.

"I'm sorry that tonight didn't go as planned," he picks up. "I just wanted-"

"Castle," she chuckles, smoothing her fingers along the length of his lapels. "Tonight may not have gone as we originally planned, but we still had our date." She shrugs, gives him one of those sly half smiles. "I still got all dressed up, we still went out, you're still taking me home."

"Home," he echoes, teasing his fingers along the single strap of her dress. They follow the slit of fabric along her collarbone, skimming along the bridge of gold across her chest, along her breasts. She curses herself for the slip of the word and for the goosebumps rising to her flesh under his touch.

Her forehead drops to his, the curls of her hair curtaining forward to dust his cheekbones. The hand not busy tracing maddening patterns back and forth over her exposed clavicle migrates to her hair, tangling in the strands.

"Yeah," she mumbles, sinking against him completely. His chest hitches beneath hers, fingers tightening in her hair. Kate tilts her chin, lips grazing the delicate skin just below his eye. "Home."

* * *

Her hand tangles in his on the brief walk from the sidewalk to his loft. Their fingers twining and toying on the ride up the elevator, stroking along his knuckles once the doors slide open and they're steps away from his front door.

No one is home, he can tell instantly. The lights are dimmed inside, the space quiet. Venturing into the kitchen, Castle finds a note on the island in his daughter's handwriting, a mention of her staying the night at Paige's while her grandmother indulges in an 'evening on the town'.

"They planned this, didn't they?"

He glances back over his shoulder to see the amusement lining Kate's features. "You have no idea. How do you think I ended up at your gala tonight?"

"I love the women in my life," he sighs, pocketing the slip of paper.

"I'll let them tell you the story tomorrow," Kate chuckles, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. "Alexis, she was the mastermind behind it all."

"I can imagine," he grins, drifting back to her standing at the edge of the foyer. "Not to mention, I'm pretty sure she would do just about anything for you or me."

Something flickers through her gaze, soft and gold like her dress. "The happiness of the people she cares about is definitely high on her priority list, yeah. Along with taking risks."

"Risks?" He arches an eyebrow. "As far as I know, Alexis isn't a big fan of risks."

"No," Kate agrees. "But she's able to recognize the importance of them. Taking risks, risking your heart... it can be scary, but necessary."

Castle closes the last few steps of distance between them, coming to a stop in front of her, looming over her by only a couple of inches thanks to her heels. "Sounds like you and Alexis had quite the conversation."

Her bottom lip is stolen by her teeth once more. "Perhaps. She's good at putting things in perspective for me."

"Oh yeah, she's a pro at that," he nods, unable to help the smile at the reminder of all the ways his daughter has altered his priorities for the better in the last fifteen years.

Kate inhales a shallow breath and shifts closer, looking shy and uncertain even after everything they did in the limo, looking like she's about to do some risk taking of her own.

"Listen, Castle, I know that I'm not the easiest person to get to know, and I don't always let on what's on my mind." She purses her lips for a moment, tangles her hands together, and if he didn't fear it would derail her and this conversation, he would steal the anxious knot of her fingers, trap them in his. But she's rallying her own defenses against her nerves, working herself back up to finishing her sentence and meeting his gaze with determination in hers. "But this past year, working with you, I've had a really good time." She pauses, flicks her eyes down to the memorized spot of his scar. "Well, until you got shot."

His lips twitch. "I'd say getting shot actually made things better for me."

"Richard Castle," she hisses, all the cautiousness from moments before gone as she reaches forward to sneak her hand beneath his suit jacket, pinching his side until he squirms. "Don't you ever-"

"Kate," he chuckles, catching the delicate bone of her wrist and stroking his thumb along the thin skin inside. He's tempted to kiss her snarling mouth, to soothe the instinctive grief that flared to life in her eyes. He settles for the gentle brush of his lips between her wrinkled brows. "I was kidding. But I won't deny that I'm grateful for the positive things that came out of it, most notably the time I've been able to spend with you."

Her skin softens beneath his lips, her nose bumping his cheek as she leans forward.

"You do know it would have happened eventually, don't you?" she murmurs, the question barely audible against his jaw.

It's his brow's turn to furrow. "What would have happened?"

She swallows, lifts her head to meet his eyes. "Us."

His heart leaps into her hands, ready to be held and crushed, while his tongue goes dry.

"I... I hoped," he manages, watching those hazel eyes examining his face, searching for something. "It's something I wanted. Always wanted, wanted even more the longer I spent with you. Especially now. I want - so much from you now, Kate. All of you."

She sucks in a breath, but doesn't look away. "I want you too, Castle." Her hand curls in the fabric of his shirt. "Just want you."

His breath catches hard, the scar in the middle of his chest throbbing with the harsh snag in oxygen.

"You already have me," he manages to croak out, expecting a smirk, a knowing gleam in her eye. But the hint of a smile across her lips is soft, whatever touch of mirth that may be left in her gaze overwhelmed by the need his words apparently caused.

It has his chest swelling with it, the amazement in how he can strike that match of desire in her eyes, the flush of arousal claiming her cheeks.

He never imagined that he could make Kate Beckett look like this. Well, actually, he imagined it enough, fantasized about what it would be like to have her looking at _him_ like this, but he surely never expected it to come true.

"You've always had me," he murmurs it like a revelation, returning his hands to their favored spot of her hips. Her fingers tighten in his dress shirt, reeling him in further. "From the moment you walked into my book party, you had me."

Their noses bump as he tilts forward, the heat of her held breath spilling across his lips.

"It was always going to be you, Kate."

Her mouth parts over his, fitting a kiss there that is more welcome than want, a prelude to the following fire that her mouth bestows upon him. He feels the arch of her toes pressing her into him, surging her body up like a wave to collide with his. It has his hands rising to bury in her hair, tangling in the curls, cradling her skull.

The buttons of his shirt fall apart under the work of her hands, the scorch of her fingers branding his chest, lingering to sear along his scar. He shrugs away the jacket and the shirt hanging at his shoulders, sighing into her mouth at the warm spread of her palm settling over his heart, the tips of her fingers dusting at his collarbone.

"No more of this," she mumbles, her hand slipping to his side, grazing his accompanying incision scar. "Can't do this again, Castle."

"Didn't enjoy playing nurse for me these last couple of months, Beckett?" he muses, gaining a nip of her teeth to his bottom lip in reprimand.

She soothes the sting with the stroke of her tongue, teasing the seam of his lips before pulling away. He tries to chase her mouth, but she drops her forehead against his, stills his progress.

"I love you," is all she says, whispering the confession like a secret into the strip of space between them.

He wonders if he could ever possibly grow used to hearing her say that, if it will always make his heart flutter and his lungs seize.

The hand not caressing his side finds his shoulder, traces down the avenue of muscles and bone to twine with his fingers.

"Let me show you how." The link of their hands has him following the light tug of her body towards his office door.

"How?" he echoes, sticking close until they've taken the familiar path through his office to reach his bedroom.

Kate reaches behind her, the soft sound of her dress unzipping, the fabric losing its grip around her body, breaking the quiet of the room. She shrugs her shoulder, dissembling the single strap, but allows him to draw it the rest of the way down.

"Let me show you how much I love you, Castle."


	16. Chapter 16

He wakes up sore.

His chest feels bruised, his side a little achier than usual, but his first deep breath is filled with her, the scent of Kate brushing along his lungs like flower petals. He turns his head, expecting to find her there, but the space of bedsheets beside him is abandoned.

Rick sits up a little too fast, the motion jarring all of his still healing spots. But he barely feels the stir of discomfort, busy scanning the room for her, coming up as empty as his sheets. His heart starts to drop, but she would never just leave, not for good.

She told him she loved him last night, she showed him, thoroughly, multiple times, she wouldn't just-

Movement from the bedroom doorway catches his eye, his heart slowing down and speeding up in the same moment. She's wearing his shirt from the night before and seemingly nothing else, the white material thin and skimming the tops of her thighs, holding onto her by a few clasped buttons. Two coffees steam from her hands, the riot of her hair loose and illuminated by the strips of sunlight flooding into his room, dying the strands gold, highlighting the shy smile stretching across her lips.

Huh, he's never witnessed that smile before and it's arguably the most adorable thing he's ever seen. Contagious too, sending his own lips splitting into a grin.

"So it wasn't a dream," he remarks, watching her eyes roll as she approaches his side of the bed, taking a seat on the edge near his hip.

"No," she chuckles, holding his mug out to him. "You definitely weren't dreaming."

The sunlight catching on the puddle of gold fabric on the floor only reaffirms it. His gaze flickers back to her, chewing on her bottom lip and staring down into her coffee.

"Nothing changes," he murmurs, unsure if he's trying harder to reassure her or himself. Kate glances back to him, a question clouding the melange of greens and browns swirling through her eyes. "I just mean, I know this… it's a big step, but we already took so many steps in the past few days, so it's-"

"Castle," she interrupts, reaching past him to set her cup down on his nightstand. "I never said I was worried about anything changing. I know a lot has… developed in the last week, but I told you what I want and I'm still feeling pretty sure of it. Did any part of last night leave _you_ thinking otherwise?"

She narrows her gaze on him the same way she would a suspect in interrogation, only she's naked underneath his shirt and her hair is gorgeously tousled from his hands and he's never going to win any argument ever again if she's going to look at him like that whilst proving her point.

"No, not at all. It's just-" One of her eyebrows arches. "You were-" He touches his fingers to his own bottom lip, starting to feel like an idiot as she tilts her head at him, not even trying to hide her amusement. "Whenever you do the lip bite thing, you're either purposely teasing me or thinking too hard about something."

"Yeah, well." Her gaze flickers to his mouth and her teeth purposely clamp over her long abused bottom lip once more. "Maybe I was thinking about all the things I want to do to you now."

He almost drops his coffee into his lap.

Her eyes linger on his chest. She touched her lips to his scars last night, painted her mouth over the raised flesh until the dead tissue tingled with life. She erased the ache, lessened his hatred for the angry knot of red in the middle of his sternum, the slice of it along his side.

"How are you feeling?" she inquires, brushing her knuckles down the path of his chest.

"A little sore," he doesn't lie, stealing her tracing hand and raising it to his lips. "But not bad. Better than ever, honestly."

She rolls her eyes at him, but he squeezes her hand, presses a kiss to her fingertips. "I didn't even know the half of it when I called you extraordinary that first day."

It's her turn to blush, to fluster, dipping her head to hide behind the curtain of her hair.

"You were right," he adds, still holding to her hand and tucking her fingers beneath his chin. His lips twitch with the memory of it, her. Her short, spiky hair and scowling mouth, dead set back then on never giving him the time of day. She was right about that too; he didn't deserve it, her, not then. Not yet. "I had no idea."

She releases a chuckle, soft and unexpected. "Yeah, well, neither did I," she admits, lifting her head to shoot him a shy smile, a glimpse of those sparkling eyes.

God, he is so in love with her, his breath catching with it. He wants to pour out all the reasons; he wants to confess how he never would have fathomed the depths of her strength, her heart, how fierce and beautifully she can love once she lets someone inside. He wants to admit how he never would have imagined, even in his wildest dreams, that she would want him for more than this, for nights in his bed or hers. How he never could have pictured her caring for him in all the ways she has in the last three months. He wants to tell her how she didn't just heal his heart, she made it new.

She made it hers.

Her fingers wiggle from underneath his chin and he blinks, glances up to find her watching.

"Stop looking at me like that," she mumbles, her cheeks still pink with color.

Castle slips their tangled hands down his chest, sealing over his heart. Hers.

"Like what?" he muses, arching a brow at her. He's curious, wondering what she sees, if he's already given himself away.

Instead, Kate shakes her head, shakes her hand free of his, and leans forward. Her palms cradle his face as her lips press to his, delicate and slow before parting for more.

He moans, his own hands rising to find her waist, reclaiming the sharp points of her hips, and guiding the rise of her body into his lap. She's drawing his bottom lip into her mouth, dragging electricity across his flesh with her tongue, when they both hear the turning lock of the front door.

Kate sighs mournfully and he does too, squeezing her waist once before letting go.

"Later," she murmurs, brushing one more kiss to the corner of his mouth, along his jaw, before pulling back.

"No question about that," he agrees, catching the robe she tosses him. "You have the entire day off."

"I do," she smirks, stepping into a pair of cotton shorts she often sleeps in. He doesn't dare ask how they ended up here, in his room. Besides, he's too pleased by the fact that she doesn't bother to rid herself of his dress shirt from the night before. Even as she's inching towards the closet.

"Beckett."

"Hmm?" she acknowledges, inside the walk-in now, paying too much attention to a stack of folded clothes. He can hear his daughter's footsteps in the foyer, and so can she.

"You're not allowed to hide in the closet."

Her eyes cut back to him, narrowing. Caught. "I am not hiding."

"Are you ashamed?"

"Shut up," she mutters, rolling her eyes at his forming grin. "I didn't want Alexis walking in here with the two of us in bed."

"Why? We're both dressed and presentable. Unless..." He arches his brow at her. "You planned to ravish me in the next ten seconds."

"Stop," she huffs, drifting back to her side of the bed and climbing in next to him, begrudgingly. "I was just - trying to be respectful."

He eases an arm around her waist, brushing his lips to her temple. "Thank you. For always looking out for her."

She curls in closer to him, knees pulled into her chest and bumping his ribcage. "I love her too, you know."

The footsteps in his office are quiet, approaching his bedroom with hesitation, her knock on the door timid.

"Dad, are you awake?"

He glances to Kate, catches her pursing her lips with hesitation of her own. He unwinds his arm from around her, reaching to snag her coffee from the nightstand before meeting her eyes once more.

"I know." He presses his lips to her forehead, hands her the mug, offering her the comfort of having something to hold, somewhere to put her hands. "Yeah, Pumpkin. You can come in."

Kate shoots him a grateful look as he draws back, cradling the cup to her chest.

The door eases open, Alexis's braid falling over her shoulder while her head pokes past the entryway. Her eyes light up when they land on Kate, a pleased smile flirting across her lips.

Relief flushes through his chest as he notices the roll of Kate's eyes behind the rim of her coffee mug.

"Morning guys," Alexis greets, the smug curve of her lips remaining in place. "I take it the gala went well?"

"Really well," Rick concurs, checking the tie of his robe before easing out of the bed to meet his daughter in the middle of the room. He pecks a kiss to the top of her head. "Thanks for ensuring that it would."

Alexis arches her brow, playing coy. "No idea what you're talking about."

"She already told me, fairy godmother," he chuckles, wrapping an arm around her shoulders and tugging her into his chest. Alexis's soft laughter gets lost in his shoulder, her hand resting gingerly over the bullet hole in his chest.

"After all you've been through, you deserve the fairytale, Dad," she whispers, squeezing him once before letting go, patting the healed flesh of his scar. "You have to tell me all about the gala, Kate. All the details."

Castle watches his daughter trot over to his bed, plopping down next to Kate with a smile illuminating her eyes. Beckett leans in, the waves of her hair glowing in the pour of sunlight into his room, her skin like gold against the white of his shirt. He can hear them talking, studying the ease of the interaction with his heart swelling - damn, he's sentimental this morning - and his lungs catching, but he doesn't try to decipher the words. Just witnessing it is enough.

Kate swats at his daughter's shoulder and shakes her head, the two sharing a quiet laugh before Alexis is rising from the bed.

"We'll discuss it over breakfast," Kate calls after her, his daughter breezing past him with another cheeky grin. Her eyes return to rest on him once Alexis is skipping through the office, head tilting with amusement. "Speaking of breakfast..."

"Whatever you want," he says automatically, drifting back to her like a man to salvation.

"Mm," she hums, pushing the covers from her legs and crawling to the edge of the mattress. She rises on her knees to snag the collar of his robe in her hands, swaying into the wall of his body. He cups her hips in his palms, swiping his thumbs back and forth over the sharp bones and hollow alcoves of flesh. "Pancakes."

An unexpected laugh climbs up his throat, delight fluttering in his chest.

"Oh, love. I'll make you all the pancakes you want because I'll definitely be thanking you for last night for the foreseeable future."


	17. Chapter 17

"Come to the Hamptons with me."

Kate glances up from the case files spread out across the desk on his office. She's been working all day on the murder of a spy neither the CIA, FBI, NSA, nor Homeland Security have heard of. A wannabe spy, she's learned, much to Castle's disappointment.

"The Hamptons?"

"Yeah." Castle closes the door and eases into the room, sticking close to the wall for support. His gate has grown much steadier in just the last month, but his body is always tense and a little shaky by the end of every full day. "For Memorial Day weekend. I know you wasted a lot of vacation days taking care of me, but you must at least have a weekend or two left in there."

"I do have a few days left," she hedges, watching his eyes gleam with hope.

"It's always been a tradition of ours - bonfires, roasting marshmallows, telling ghost stories, sleeping late," he lists with a sigh that makes her lips quirk.

"Sounds nice," she hums, lowering the pen to the desk. "Kind of magical, actually."

"And it's right on the ocean, has a secluded pool. You could lay out," he suggests, approaching the desk with his gaze tripping over her. "Work on your tan."

She smirks. "Wow, Castle. For a man who's seen me naked, you're working really hard to see me in a swimsuit."

"I'm sure it's a beautiful sight," he muses, easing around the desk to share space. "And I'd love the opportunity to peel one off of you."

Heat simmers in her abdomen and she eases her chair back from the desk.

"Of course, if you aren't comfortable in a swimsuit, you can always just skinny dip," he grins, propping his hip against the edge of his desk.

"Do you really want to risk scarring Alexis like that?" she asks with an arch of her brow, but he's already shaking his head.

"Won't have to. Unfortunately, my daughter is dead-set on getting a head start to a higher education," he sighs mournfully. "Therefore, she will not be joining me this time. A once in a lifetime opportunity to spend a weekend at Princeton preparing for college is apparently more important that popping fireworks on the beach with me."

"Unfortunately," Kate mimics with a roll of her eyes.

"Don't mock my pain. We've been doing this since she was five," he huffs, casting eyes to her case file. "But having you there would ease my pain significantly."

"Haven't I done enough of that?" she teases, leaning back in the desk chair, watching those eyes as blue as the ocean he's been raving about darken yet still shine like sunlight across the sea.

"Exactly, you're an expert at this point. Don't you want to try aquatic therapy with me, Beckett?"

She bites her bottom lip. "Maybe. Or maybe I'd rather punish you for that book title."

He winces. "I was going to tell you-"

"_Naked Heat_, Castle? Really?"

"Fine, you're right. Punish me. It's what I deserve. But, keep in mind, it's also the last mandatory week of my recovery," he adds, his lips curving with a genuine smile. "We could have a relaxing weekend on the beach, fit in some naked punishment in the bedroom..."

Her cheeks flush despite herself and she rests one against the prop of her cool fist.

"And then, next week, I can finally come back to the Twelfth with you."

The lovely layer of heat swirling through her insides begins to dissipate under the spill of cold through her system at his words.

"Rick," she sighs, dropping her gaze to his hand on the edge of the desk, steadying him. "You coming back... I don't think it's a good idea."

He's quiet for a moment and she hates it. Castle silent is rarely a good thing.

"I understand." She reluctantly glances upwards to find him staring down at her with, indeed, a good dose of understanding, but also... a hint of apology? "Kate, what I put you through-"

"No," she cuts him off as she rises from the chair. "_You_ didn't do anything to me. Dunn's the one who shot you, but that's my point, Castle. There's always going to be someone with a gun, or a knife, or a bomb, trying to kill us, and I can't have you mixed up in that. I signed up for it when I put on that badge. You didn't-"

"I signed up for it the second I saw you," he argues, eyes piercing and vehement, but also calm. Certain. "I'm your backup, that's what you said, but really, I'm more than that, aren't I?"

"Of course you are," she hisses, hating him for making her have to say it.

"Not just here," he growls, gaze flicking to her mouth. She hates him for that too, stealing her move. "But out there. At the precinct, in the field, I'm your partner. I watch your back, you watch mine - that's how it works. Not with me stuck here while you're out there alone."

"Castle," she groans, pressing her fingers to her temples. He grabs both her wrists, pulls them to his chest, one of her fists against his heart. The bullet wound.

"I know I'm not a cop, I know you can look out for yourself, that you have Espo and Ryan, an entire force that would fight for you. But I can't stay away like that," he admits, stroking his thumbs over the slim bones of her wrists. "I love you, Kate. I love working with you, being inspired by you, having your back. Don't make me stay away."

She huffs and drops her head forward, forehead resting to his chin.

"I can't - Castle, if I lost you... I almost lost you and I can't," she rasps, her voice shaking with it.

He lets go of her wrists to band his arms around her frame.

"Me neither," he whispers, resting his chin atop her head. It allows her to bury her face in his neck, to be reassured by the warmth of his skin, the scent of his aftershave, to concentrate on the beat of his heart so strong beneath her hand. "I couldn't stand to lose you either."

Kate sighs and turns her head to press her cheek to his clavicle, closing her eyes and letting herself be held for a few long moments.

"Can we talk more about it later?" she murmurs, feeling his chin dislodge from her head, tilting lower.

"Of course." His cheek grazes her skin, nose brushing along her brow. "Can I continue trying to convince you to come to the Hamptons with me instead?"

The laugh bubbles breathless and soft from her lips.

"Yeah, Castle," she hums, the threatening tears dissolving in the corners of her eyes and mouth seeking his. "Please do."

* * *

Montgomery sighs, shaking his head at the conclusion of Beckett's rundown of the case. "So Roger was right about being followed that night."

Last night, after allowing Castle to seduce her into accepting the idea of accompanying him to the Hamptons, multiple times, he let her run through the case facts again. He brainstormed with her, made her miss his presence in the precinct even more, and eventually, triggered that brilliant lightbulb in her head that only he has ever been able to illuminate.

Kate nods. "Well, when the husband got on to the affair, he did a little spy game of his own. Tracked down and killed his wife's lover."

"Two affairs, a loveless marriage." Her captain casts his gaze to meet hers. "It's sad a man had to die because all the people involved were too scared to say what they really felt."

Beckett's narrows in response. "Yes, it is sad."

But she doesn't have the time to analyze Montgomery's response, what he may have been trying to imply, because her eyes catch on the opening doors of the elevator and her heart skips at the sight of the man stepping out of it.

"Good work, Detective," Roy adds, patting her shoulder before brushing past for his office. "Keep Castle out of the break room. We aren't done decorating."

"Yes, sir," she answers, but she's already striding for the writer drifting into her bullpen.

"Did you get the guy?" Castle grins, hands rising to flutter at her hips before he forces his fists to return to his sides. He's respecting her space, keeping a friendly distance to maintain workplace discretion, the kind of ruling she was quick to enforce regarding their relationship. But today, it's the last thing she cares about.

Screw rules and procedure and proper etiquette - this case snagged her heart with its devastating end, made her miss him even more than usual, and she's just so damn happy to see him.

"Yeah," she murmurs, hooking her fingers in the lapels of his suit jacket. God, it's so nice to have him back in her precinct, back in his preferred attire of a button up and slacks, back where they belong.

His brow quirks just slightly, as if questioning her motives.

"I'm just... glad you're here," she says by way of explanation, her skin warming under the soft drape of his palms at her waist.

"So am I," he smiles, so lovely and genuine. She wants to kiss him so badly.

He can tell.

"Kate," he chuckles, rubbing his thumb along the jut of her hipbone.

"Are you all packed?" she asks, to distract them both.

"Yep. Ready to go as soon as we get home," he says proudly. "We'll drop Alexis off at Princeton, I'll spend a half hour in mourning, and then the three day weekend is ours."

Beckett grins, fingers grazing the covered skin of his collarbones.

"What's up with you?" he questions under his breath, amusement still lining his lips, the curiosity gleaming in his eyes. "You're never _this_ happy to see me. Not even since we started-"

"Shh," she hisses, cutting her eyes to the shut break room door. When she glances back to him, he's smirking beneath her glare.

"This is more of what I'm used to."

Kate huffs and lowers her hands from his shirt, snagging one of his from her waist on the way down.

"Nothing's up with me, I just... this case had me thinking."

"About?" he inquires, shifting to the side, hiding their linked hands as a uniform walks past.

"Everything," she shrugs, redirecting her gaze to their loosely knotted fingers. "You, us, the last three months."

His hand squeezes gently. "Good things, I hope?"

Kate purses her lips. "Castle, I-"

"Yo, Beckett," Esposito calls from the break room door that's swinging open. She sighs, but arches an eyebrow in his direction. "Oh, hey, Castle," he adds with a grin.

"Good to see you, Espo," Castle smiles despite the interruption, but his thumb is circling her knuckle.

"You guys mind meeting us in the break room real quick?" Esposito asks, Ryan popping up behind his shoulder.

"Castle! What are you doing here?" Ryan chimes in, shooting Beckett what she supposes he thinks is a subtle wink.

"You... asked me to come?" Rick replies, his smile quizzical now.

"Go back in," Esposito mutters under his breath.

"We'll be right there," Kate cuts in with a smirk. The boys both nod, backpedaling inside and griping at each other like children. "Act surprised, okay?"

"I've already been practicing my reaction," he beams, shuffling backwards to lean into the support of her desk and drawing her along with him. She's standing between his partially bent knees, watching that crooked smile of his come to life for her. "You were saying?"

"Just that... I've been thinking, about this last case. About... the 'welcome back' party waiting for you in there," she says with a nod of her head, a twitch of her lips. "How I would like you to come back after all."

"Beckett," he murmurs, running his thumb back and forth over the line of her pulse at her wrist. "We talked about this... you can still take some time to think about it, I don't mind."

She nods once more, flipping her palm to snag his, to draw his hand up to her lips. He watches as she presses a kiss to his knuckles, lets the fist of their fingers rest beneath the tuck of her chin.

"I know, I just don't need it." He grins, rising from his resting place against her desk. "Besides, a summer without you around here would be pretty miserable."

"Very true," he chuckles, fingers unfurling from the knot of hers to graze along her throat, skimming her jaw. "Kate, can I kiss you?"

"You aren't officially back yet," she muses, hooking her fingers in his shirt collar once more. "So yeah, Castle. Kiss me."

He's just barely brushed his lips to hers when a startle of applause erupts from a few feet away, both of them jerking apart at the sound. But it's just the boys, Lanie, a few officers who have worked with them, and Captain Montgomery.

Kate huffs and sways back towards him, her hand instinctively rising to splay protectively over his scar. "Move too fast?"

"No, no, all good," he laughs quietly.

"Finally," Esposito says loud enough for her to catch, bumping fists with Ryan while Lanie rolls her eyes.

Her best friend shoots her a quick wink though, before snagging a layer of dollar bills from LT.

"We could skip this," Kate mutters, but Rick is shaking his head and stealing her hand again.

"No, come on. Party, Alexis, and then Hamptons. Perfect start to the summer," he reminds her, dragging her towards their friends, earning a wolf whistle from Ryan that has her glare intensifying. "We won't stay long."

She shakes her hand free of his to snake her arm beneath his jacket, easing it around his waist and leaning into his good side. He hums his assent, hooks his arm around her shoulders.

"Love you, Kate," he murmurs the words along the shell of her ear like a soft caress.

It isn't until after Castle's return party at the precinct, after they've bid their friends a temporary goodbye, earned a subtle nod of approval from her captain, and they're safely enclosed in the elevator that she has the chance to say it back.

Her arms around his neck and her body pressed in close, she seals a kiss to his mouth that has his recovered heart pounding against hers.

"I love you too, Castle," she grins, letting the lovely freedom of saying it wash over her, letting her hand find rest atop the bullet scar on his chest.

He kisses her once more - thorough and breath stealing until the elevator doors are sliding open. But she doesn't rush to draw away from him, lingering instead.

Three months ago, he nearly died trying to protect her from a serial killer, and now, he's kissing her in the precinct elevator. It's not how she ever would have imagined it, would have planned it even, but she wouldn't change it.

Rick leads her out by the hand, into the warming air of the impending summer, back to gushing about the Hamptons and his excitement to share it all with her.

No, she wouldn't change it at all.


	18. Chapter 18

**Epilogue: **

**one year later**

* * *

His pounding heart eases like a sigh of relief when he finds her. She's sitting on the beach mere inches from the water, wrapped in one of his button downs with the long strands of her hair whipping free from her braid with the ocean breeze. She came out here for solitude, he knows, but after over a year together, she should know he can only give her so much.

"There's no way I was this bad of a patient for you," Castle huffs, plopping down beside her in the sand. He's teasing her, trying to lighten the mood with the sarcasm she tends to embrace and throw right back at him.

She doesn't respond, though. He can't see her face, can't see directly into her eyes, but he can already envision the frustrated tears swimming through her gaze.

"Kate," he sighs, reaching tentatively for the hand at her side. She lets him have it, lets him have a glimpse of her worn features and pained expression. Pained, because of the physical trauma her body has endured, and because of the infliction of an entirely different kind of trauma. "I'm sorry, love."

"No," she rasps, swallowing hard before shifting closer to him. The cool line of her body shudders to a rest against his, her entire frame deflating bone by bone to settle into him. He feels his own rabbiting heart settle, eased by the reassuring weight of her, the welcome warmth of her presence. Sanctuary for them both. "I'm sorry, Rick. You've been so good to me and I've been... pretty horrible to put up with."

"I was kidding," he points out quickly, earning the soft shake of her head against his shoulder.

"I know, doesn't make it any less true," she murmurs, the gentle quirk of a smile easing the edge in her voice, easing every ragged piece inside of him. "Though, I wouldn't say you were the ideal patient either."

"Hey," he mutters, nudging his cheek against her temple. "I was the best patient you could have hoped for and you were my favorite nurse."

"I was your only nurse," she mutters, lighting up his insides with delight. He loves when she gets territorial, loves even more when she forgets for even a moment what's happened, why they're here.

"Yes, you were, sweetheart," he placates, chuckling at the dig of her nails into his palm. "I loved every second of it."

"Of course you did," she sighs, burying her face in his shoulder. He swears he can feel her grin through the fabric of his t-shirt.

"I did, because that's when I knew," he answers with relish.

"Knew what?" she mumbles, her response muffled but still intelligible.

Castle's lips spread. "That I was in love with you, that you were in love with me. The circumstances weren't the best, I'll admit that, but you already know I'd take a bullet again any day if it meant I ended up with you-"

"Don't say that," she hisses, lifting her head to glare at him with those tired eyes, still managing to ignite a fire in them.

"Sorry, sensitive subject, I know-"

"No, it's more than that," she presses. "This isn't a joke, Castle. This wasn't some random serial killer with a personal vendetta coming after us, it's not a run of the mill case gone wrong. It was a sniper at Montgomery's funeral," she reminds him through grit teeth, sobering his senses with the single sentence. "It was you trying to jump in front of me for the second damn time."

"Kate," he whispers, because she's crying now. Thick, slow tears trekking down her cheeks.

They've had this argument before, before the shooting at Montgomery's funeral last month, after the fact, and it's proven to be an argument that neither one of them will ever win. He's all too willing to die to keep her alive and she's absolutely unwilling to accept it, all while both of them know she would have done the exact same thing in both situations. She would have taken a bullet for him whether it was Scott Dunn or the man who murdered her mother pulling the trigger.

He lowers his forehead to rest against hers, feels the careful exhale of her breath fan out along his chin.

"I love you," he murmurs, brushing the fingers of his free hand to the line of her jaw, wiping away the trails of moisture he can catch. "I'm sorry."

She laughs, a soft, pitiful thing that breaks his heart, and slowly shakes her head. "No, Castle. Please don't ever be sorry for loving me."

His heart cinches, but Kate is drawing their twined hands up from the sand, dragging his knuckles to rest against the stitched up hole in the middle of her chest.

"Part of me will always regret the way it happened, how we got here," she confesses, the soft inhale of her breath nearly drowned out by the rush and fall of the ocean mere inches away from their feet. "But I don't regret the story it's given us. How it changed my life, gave me you."

"Aww, Beckett," he sighs, nuzzling her nose with his own. "Sounding more like the sappy romantic I've always known you to be."

She curses him under her breath, but he's already soothing the scowl along her lips with the tender sweep of his thumb to the corner of her mouth.

"There are parts I don't like very much either," he concedes, wiping away the last of the tear tracks on her skin. "I hate this part." He drops his gaze to the knot of their hands at her chest. "I hate seeing you hurt, from... from both the bullet and the case. I hated losing Montgomery, I hated our fight, I hated that day in the cemetery-"

The squeeze of her hand draws him back, back to the beach on his property in the Hamptons, away from her mother's case, from the shock of Roy Montgomery's involvement, from the ache of fighting with her because he became so afraid for her, for them. Back from the sheer agony of holding her body in the grass as her blood spilled hot and fast onto his hands.

She lived. After hours of surgery and over a week in the hospital, after days of consulting with Jordan Shaw from the FBI along with Ryan and Esposito, after ensuring that Jim Beckett was in possession of directions to his place in the Hamptons, they were able to escape to the haven of his home on the beach. It's only been a month, but she's already healing, regaining basic abilities that the hellish ordeal of being shot in the chest entails losing.

She's frustrated, she's hurt, but she's here, letting him take care of her like she took care of him a mere year ago.

"But as long as I get to keep you," he finishes, releasing a deep breath.

Kate's untethered hand rises to seal against his sternum, slim fingers draping over the slow throb of his heart.

While she remained stuck in the hospital, she would coerce him to climb into the hospital bed with her, gritting her teeth to make room for him and sighing relief against his neck once he would finally settle beside her.

"We match," she murmured once, placing her hand to the memorized spot of the scar on his chest. She was dazed with sleep and morphine, but the mournful smile still slid across her lips and shattered his heart with the devastating realization that she was right.

Kate lowers her head to rest her cheek to his shoulder, her body curling tentative and careful into the cove of his. She won't be able to remain like this, her gunshot wound's protest at the position inevitable, but while she does, he holds her close. While she does, it feels like home.

"Always," she murmurs, the single word and Kate Beckett at his side providing all the affirmation he needs. "Always, Castle."

* * *

**A/N: I can't express how grateful I am to everyone who may have taken the time to read this story. It always has and always will be a true pleasure to write about these two characters and the greatest privilege to share my work with people who are gracious enough to read it. Thank you for your kindness, your faith, and your encouragement. It means everything.**


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